Having had both courses that have been graded on exam performance and coursework, I prefer the latter. I've always thought exams are somewhat counter-productive; they don't really test how much you've learned, but more how much you can remember under terrifying stressful conditions that you probably won't face outside of the exam hall unless you're either in a highly competitive role or have anxiety so severe that you probably shouldn't be doing the job in the first place.
They're not suited to everyone's learning style or even to the courses themselves sometimes. I always thought English exams were a bit stupid; surely a written piece or an analysis is better done in essay format so you can dissect it and show you understand it properly, rather than through a timed exam where you don't necessarily have time to dissect it? I vaguely remember needing multiple sheets of additional paper for my English Language and Literature exams in College and still not covering everything. My handwriting degenerated into a barely legible scrawl the further along I got, and I somehow managed to write about twelve pages in under an hour. My writing is about as big as my post text.
Time is another factor...there is either too much or too little. Sure, you can leave between the first and last half hour, but my god, you'd have to be insane or just give up entirely to want to do that. My exams in University were horrific, because for the most part they were three hours long and I needed every second. I'm amazed I could even remember the way home after I'd finished some of them; they're mentally exhausting and, when you've got two back-to-back or one every day for a solid week (or both) it's absolute murder. Exams are very bad for your mental health in some ways. There really shouldn't be an exam period, because juggling multiple subjects for revision is part of what makes it so damn stressful.
Coursework is still pretty terrifying when it piles up - and a dissertation is worse still; I'd take an exam period over a dissertation any day - but at least it's evenly spread out throughout the year and, if you psyduck up one piece, it's not the end of the world. It's not suited for everything, but it's still a much better way of testing everyone rather than just those lucky people who work well under exam conditions. I've seen many people fail exams but ace their coursework and get a lackluster grade that they didn't deserve as a result.
Exam period for me was stressful up to the moment of the exam itself, but that's mostly because I'm a worrier and my revision techniques were totally different to everyone else's, especially during University. My acquaintances would spend at least eight hours a day revising, and my lecturers said that between eight and ten, depending on the subject, was optimum. I'd spend a maximum of four solid hours between 8am and 12pm, plus maybe an hour or so reading my notes during idle moments. I did very little indeed, and I always worried it wouldn't be enough. Time has proven to me (I never scored below 60% in exams that counted towards my final grade) that quality is more important than quantity, but it's hard to keep that in mind when people around you are pulling all-nighters or doing full work days revising. It's pretty damn terrifying. That said, I did start revising about a month in advance of the exam, whereas a lot of people would start the week before.
I always used to break out in a wave of acne and my weight would drop substantially, as I started skipping meals, too. The day of the exam I wouldn't eat anything until I was out of the hall because I just couldn't face it. My coping mechanisms for stress are extremely detrimental to my physical health, unfortunately.
In the exams themselves, I was fine...I think. I went on autopilot and just let things come to me; about all I can remember of my exams is snatches of moments where I'd come off autopilot for a few seconds to glance at the clock, usually to think either "Good, plenty of time..." or "Psyduckpsyduckpsyduckhurryhurryhurry" or something similar. I have a horribly vivid memory of one of my University exams, but that's mostly because I had exam flu and those three hours dragged out to feel like three bloody years.
I'm fairly lucky in that I found how I best retain knowledge fairly early on in life and I was able to apply that through College and University to get the marks I wanted to get and a little better besides...plus I suppose I'm fairly intelligent; at least, my marks would imply that I'm intelligent in an academic sense. Exams were bad for me, but nothing I couldn't handle. I wouldn't want to do them again, though.
tl;dr exams are not something I miss and if you've got some coming up you have my most sincere sympathies, because I don't think they're fun under any circumstances, even when they're easy. Complacency costs marks, as my science teacher used to say...