Customer Reviews

Dental Admission Test (DAT) Computerized Sample Tests and Guide, TopScore Pro for the DAT

5 star:		(24)
4 star:		(29)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I just took my DAT two days ago. Before the test I came to this website to read what people have wrote about the TOPSCORE product and the DAT in general. It seems that everyone thinks that the real DAT is much easier than the practice tests.

Before taking the DAT I took the Kaplan course, and bought the TOPSCORE CD ROM. I must say that TOPSCORE is a great tool regardless of anything. The test on that CD ROM are of good quality.

I was scoring consitently 25 on organic chem, 20 on general chem, 20-21 on Biology, 18 on math, 20-21 on reading, and 22-23 on PAT.
Some of my "practice test" scores like Organic, reading and PAT, never deviated from 25, 21, 23 respectively.

So I came to this website nad developed a notion through reading of other reviews that the real test would be just like the practice test ADA supplies. It was not the case at all, I thought that the real test was more difficult than than any of the practice test I took before. Reading was crazy, the articles they gave on the real test were pretty hardcore. Also the organic chemistry portion was pretty difficult. The monitor wasn;t "super high resolution monitor" that ADA claims it to be. So when the PAT part came a lot of times it was difficult to see intricatedetails about the object in the monitor.

I am dissapointed with my overall score of Academic - 18, PAT - 20. These are certainly not the scores I was getting on practice tests.

The advice I would give to other students is this:

1) Understand that real DAT is NOT easier than the practice test on TOPSCORE. It is not MUCH harder, but it is not easier.

2) STUDY THE WHOLE SUBJECT. that wasy when you get asked something you know how to approach the question from any angle. A good example is trigonometry. Don't just memorize the inequlities, understand it. There were a LOT of TRIG questions on the QR portion on the DAT I took.

3) Kaplan course was good. However the class itself is a complete waste of time. Be ready to do ALL work on your own.

4) NEVER underestimate the power of your old textbooks. Its much better to review the whole concept of Thermodynamics, than to remember specific question types involving Hess's law.

5) Please understand that although TOPSCORE has a pretty good PAT section,the real DAT PAT is a bit harder. The quality of real DAT is a bit less, and I found key whole and ESPECIALLY angle ranking onthe real PAT more challenging. If you want to prepare yourself for real DAT angle ranking...get BARRON's DAT Book, and the ADA practice test. These bookswill prepare you well. Don;t rely on Top SCORE.

Good luck

Overall, TopScore Pro is worth the money and time.

I took the DAT in March of 2004 and here are my scores. Academic Average 21, Biology 23, General Chemistry 22, Organic Chemistry 23, Reading Comp. 22, Quant. Reasoning 16 and Perceptual Ability 18.

I have been out of college 2.5 years now, married, and have a full time job. I started off studying my college text books. Of course, college text books are very specific, but I was determined to read my biology and organic chemistry books again before I even took a study test. That helped tremendously.

The first practice tests I took were actually Kaplan's DAT study guide and the test in the DAT preparation booklet put out by ADA. The Kaplan book is worth the money too for the practice. Anyway, after those initial test, I took TopScore Pro. As I read in other reviews, the science sections were harder than the actual test. I routinely scored 17 or 18 for total science on TopScore, but had 23 on the real DAT. The reading and quatitative are about the same as the real DAT. But, the real DAT perceptual ability (PA) is harder than the TopScore Pro tests. I scored about 19 or 20 with the TopScore test, but 18 on the real DAT for PA.

The DAT preparation booklet put out by ADA was really closest to the level of difficulty you will see on the DAT. But, if you can master the Kaplan and TopScore science sections, you should do well on the real DAT science. With perceptual ability, basically the more practice you get, the better.

About a month ago, I was on this website looking for additional materials to prepare for my DAT exam. I went ahead and bought this program, and I'M VERY happy that I did. Before, I was taking Kaplan practice exams and getting scores between 15-18 in the Natural Sciences, and 18-19 in the Reading Section and Perception sections, and 14 in the math. I got worried, so I bought this program immediately. I took the first test and scored average (16 Bio, 16 GChem, 17OChem, 19Perception, 19Reading, 16Math). Once I took these exams, I'd go over and over and over them, backwards and forwards, looking at and relearning concepts. By my last exam, I scored (18Bio, 18GChem, 20OChem, 20Perception, 19Reading, 17Math). But, during the few weeks before the real DAT, I was going over the 3 exams in this CDROM, and the other 3 exams I'd taken at Kaplan. I went over them religiously. On the real DAT, I scored higher than any practice exam I'd ever taken. Here are my real scores: 20Bio, 22GChem, 25OChem, 19Perception, 20Reading, 20Math. I'm VERY VERY happy with these scores. I think this program is WELL worth your money and time, if you're willing to spend the time to go over every exam repeatedly, until you know the answers perfectly. The testing screen is identical to the real DAT. This program doesn't give explanations to the answers, but it's not a big deal, because when you get something wrong, you know where to go to look it up and end up learning more than you would just by reading an answer explanation. Practice is the key for this exam, and the more you get, the better you'll do. I HIGHLY reccomend this program to anyone who is serious about doing well on the DAT. I'm generally not a good standardized test-taker, but this really gave me the confidence and most importantly the practice to really do well on the real DAT. YOU DEFINATELY NEED TO GET THIS PROGRAM.

I took the DAT 10 days ago and must say topscore is only good for practice. The PAT is way too easy and contains many errors. even worse was that quire a few pat questions on the 3 exams are either identical or only slightly different. quantitative reasoning & gchem sections contain quite a few questions that requires too much time to solve. Reading comprehension on topscore is shorter than the real dat. Topscore should include explanations to their questions, this would reduce the amount of errors on the exams.

to anyone preparing for the DAT, i recommend the Kaplan review guide & if you can, get the Kaplan subject tests. Those were my main materials & i scored 30, 29, 25 on bio, gchem & ochem respectively. as a previous reviewer wrote, the graphics for the PAT on the real exam in really bad. be prepared for windows 98 with flickering monitor. despite bad hardwares, i managed a 23 on PAT. my AA was a 26.

Nothing on the market out there right now comes closer to a real DAT simulation than this. It does make it a lot harder than the test really is though on the science part. The average from my 3 practice tests were: Biol. 16, Chem. 14, O-chem 14, QR 18, RC 21, and PAT 18. I felt bad that I studied so much and did that bad on the practice tests in the science. Although my version did contain quite a few obvious errors, I still wasn't very confident in my scores. But for the real test (I just took it last week) my AA = 21 and PAT = 19. (Biol. 20, Chem. 19, O-chem 22, QR 22, RC 23!) Be sure to check out scholarware's web site because now they show what errors are in each version (and you can get paid for showing them more).

What Top Score still needs in order to get a 5-star rating from me is an explanation for the answers to the questions. (If they did this, I'm sure they'd find their own errors a lot quicker.)

Good luck all on your DAT!

I had spent a month and a half preparing fairly intensely for the DAT with Kaplan's prep book (GREAT product by the way...BUY KAPLAN'S BOOK for sure), but decided I wanted some realistic testing experience, so I bought this CD. I must say that I was quite impressed with what TopScore had done in the overall environment of the test. The 3 tests on the CD opened my eyes to the type of questions I needed to be prepared for in each of the 4 sections of the DAT, and it also awakened me to a need to study certain parts more than others (mainly the science section).

I took my test today and scored well overall with a 22 Academic Average. My scores from the science section (Bio 23, G Chem 20, O Chem 23) turned out well, but I was a little disappointed with the PAT. With TopScore I was getting 22-24's, but on the real test, I got a 19. Not bad...not great. TopScores PAT sections were quite a bit easier than the real thing. The shapes on the actual test are much more complex and the choices for answers vary only slightly so that distinguishing between right and wrong is more difficult. On a plus side, though, TopScore really helps with the Reading Comprehension (I scored a 24 today) by giving you an understanding of how to toggle between the questions and passage, plus giving an overall feel of the type of material you need to be prepared to have to read and respond to. The Quantitative Reasoning was also very realistic in TopScore. I was getting 18-20's with the CD and scored an 18 today on the real thing. Again, not bad...not great. I just seemed like there wasn't enough time to get through everything. But, this was also the feeling I had from TopScore, so it will prepare you for the real thing fairly well.

Overall, I'd say this product is well worth the money. Do NOT rely on TopScore to teach yourself the info you need for the DAT, but DO use TopScore to help climatize yourself to the real DAT testing environment. Best wishes on studying and testing!

If you're going to prepare for the DAT, purchasing this software is still a good idea. However, please be aware of certain weaknesses of this software, as there are some: 1) After taking the real DAT, I realized the science sections of this software were more difficult, partly due to the highly specific nature of the questions. 2) I noted that there were an annoying number of incorrect answers on the PAT sections of this test. A portion of the sample questions were clearly variations of those on the official test. Yet, some of these figures were misdrawn, (esp on the top-front-end sections) such that diagrams contradicted each other. Therefore, we're forced to guess between two wrong answers, trying to predict which was the intended correct answer.

First of all, you can't beat the price for three full-length DAT exams that simulate the computer-based format. The simulation is exactly like the actual test, with some nice bonus features.

The TopScore Pro is a good indicator of your success on the actual DAT, except for the science sections. In the sciences it is considerably more difficult. In the other sections, I found it to be very closely correlated. For example, I scored 14-17 for the sciences on the TopScore. On the actual exam, I scored 22, 21, 23 for Bio, Gen. Chem., and Org. Chem. respectively. It is good to know this ahead of time, or you may be unnecessarily discouraged with your science scores. For reference, I had been out of my undergraduate sciences for about 7-8 years.

As with preparation for any important exam, do not rely on any one preparation tool. The TopScore Pro is most effective when combined with other forms of preparation. The Schaum's outlines for the sciences are excellent, easy to read, and give you exactly what you need to review. Kaplan books and CD-ROMs are mediocre in my opinion. I never took an actual preparation course. I believe it is a huge waste of money - paying $1300 for someone else to cheer you on in your studying. The Barron's DAT book was actually very helpful for me early on in my preparation. Its science sections correlate more closely to the actual exam than TopScore Pro.

Overall, the TopScore Pro was great preparation for me immediately before the DAT. Its exams helped show my weak areas in the final hours. And it prepared me for what to expect when I sat in front of the computer screen before the real test. I would highly recommend this product to anyone.

I looked far and wide for a study material for the DAT. I bought "Barron's 2000" edition and it proved to be very successful. However, I did not know what to expect on the DAT after I had put in the time of studying. So, I bought TopScore's DAT prep tests. These tests were unbelievable! When I took all of the tests, I never was satisfied with my scores. In fact, the following were my scores on one of the tests:

Biology - 16, Gen. Chemistry - 15, Org. Chemistry - 13, PAT - 19, Reading Comprehension - 21, Quantitative Reasoning - 19.

I was really worried about the Science part of the exam. Taking the tests let me know where my weaknesses were. I went back and studied more for the exam until I thought I was ready. (However, my science score didn't improve much after taking another practice exam.) I then went and took the actual DAT and here are my scores:

Biology -24, Gen. Chemistry - 19, Org. Chemistry - 17, PAT - 19, Reading Comprehension - 20, Quantitative Reasoning - 19. My Academic average was 20! My PAT was 19.

I thought that the actual DAT was much easier than TopScore's version. I would advise any pre-dental student to buy this software. You wouldn't believe the joy that I had after getting my actual results.

I just took the DAT and I have to say this TOPSCORE program is very useful. I agree with the other statements in that the Natural Sciences section is much, much easier on the DAT; particularily the General Chem.
On all 3 Topscore G-chem tests I averaged 16/30 questions correct for a score of 15. On the DAT I got 26/30 correct for a score of 20. I have to say that at least 5 of the g-chem question were of the very simple concentration/molarity conversion variety.
Biology was very easy on the DAT; focus, focus, focus on the genetics of Punnets squares and you'll breeze through this section when the time comes. I scored in the 97% on Bio and only got a 22-how does that make sense?
On the other hand, Organic Chem on the DAT is very similar to the Topscore. So no break here folks; study hard. On my DAT many questions focused on the E1/E2, S1/S2 reactions. You must know the properties of the several main types of organic molecules( ol,one,oic, oyl,ane,ene,yne) sugars, and proteins and you must know the official names of the reactions. I reccomend Kaplan for this.
The Perceptual ability test was much harder on the Real DAT. For keyhole and views; the DAT focused more on nooks and crannies of complex 3-d structures while Topscore focused more on line of sight. Pack the Visine for the angle-measuring section because it is very straining compared to Topscore's.
I totally ignored q-reasoning and reading comp and still scored 17 and 21, respectively. Topscore is not very useful for these 2 sections, but these are the two easiest sections afterall. The reading topics on the DAT were very dull but fairly easy to follow, like Topscore.
Overall, I have to say that Topscore is very useful for testing your knowledge of the natural sciences. It is not as useful for the other subjects.