Customer Reviews

Kaplan GMAT 800, 2006-2007

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I first bought the regular Kaplan GMAT 2007 study guide and it helped me get a general overview of the GMAT questions, format, and some basic practice. But I found that it lacked the most difficult questions (especially in the Quantitative section), and although I got 96% of those right on the practice exams they were far easier than the ones I faced on the real GMAT. So I ended up with a 630 (78th percentile) and was disappointed. I then went out and bought this GMAT 800 book for more practice and "the toughest questions," and found it really very useful. It does away with the lengthy text about strategies and gets down to the questions themselves, focusing on different types of tricky questions that the GMAT test makers love to pose. I suppose it worked, since I just took the GMAT again (about 6 weeks later, having only used this book to study for about a week) and scored 750 (98th percentile)!! I highly recommend this, although you need to at least skim through the other one (or a similar guide) first to get the hang of the GMAT format and different question types before using this book.

Now that the GMAT has issued a revised 11th edition of the Official Guide for GMAT Review, plus new supplementary official guides for both the verbal and quantitative sections of the test, the case for spending additional hard-earned money and scarce study time on the Kaplan review prep book is not as strong as it used to be. On the other hand, a case can be made. While the questions in the official GMAT books have the advantage of being actual test questions rather than Kaplan attempts to emulate the well vetted questions written by ETS (and recently Pearson Vue), most of the official guides' questions have already appeared in the 10th edition of the official GMAT guide, which means that if you have the previous edition, you won't get much additional questions by buying the newer official GMAT books. Although the new GMAT books offer what the publisher calls "improved" explanations, many of the explanations for the reading passages and analytic reasoning sections are still useless and circular -- like answer D is correct because answer D is, uhm, correct. (I find the math explanations to be adequate, however.) In addition, because the computer administered test is adaptive, offering harder questions as you continue to get right answers, the Official Guide GMAT book questions won't be representative of the actual mix you will get when you actually take the test, particularly if you are likely to be a high scorer, in which case the hardest 20% in the GMAT book will be more likely to represent the actual questions you will be answering.

Kaplan, on the other hand, makes more of an attempt to offer insightful explanations to test questions, even if their answers are at times deficient. Kaplan also offers advice on test strategy with regard to timing, using process of elimination, and ways of coping with particularly difficult questions or reading passages, which GMAT seems to be reluctant to do. In other words, the Kaplan approach is more like true coaching, as opposed to offering just a bunch of practice test questions. In summary, I would say that this is a useful addition to the preparation arsenal, although the main focus should still be on the official GMAT preparation materials.

GMAT 800 is a very popular book. Whoever at Kaplan came up with the name ought to get a raise and an immediate promotion to the head of the marketing department. Everybody wants an 800, and we'd all like to think that working really hard through the materials in one book will get us there.

Of course, that's ridiculous. This book claims to have the "hardest problems," and while it has a few, that's just not true. A better title would be "GMAT 720." That's not to say the book isn't worthwhile. It probably does have more difficult problems than any other popular book on the market--it certainly contains more than any other Kaplan book or the Official Guides.

I am disappointed, however, with the way material is distributed in this book. The hardest questions on the GMAT aren't equally divided among every content area: there's more difficult Data Sufficiency than Problem Solving and more probability than algebra. However, there are only a handful of probability questions in this book, and the Problem Solving/Data Sufficiency split is heavily weighted toward the former. There are indeed more Problem Solving questions on the GMAT, but high-scoring students aiming for the top need Data Sufficiency practice more.

If you are scoring 650 or better and aim higher, this is a great book to have. However, don't put too much stock in the tips--they aren't explained terribly well, and in my opinion they aren't even the best methods to do some of their problems. If you can comfortably do every question in this book in a reasonable amount of time, you may not get a perfect score, but you'll do very well.

I took the GMAT before and scored a 670. That was a good score for me but I willing to try again to hit the 700 level. I knew that I didn't want to buy any one of those myriad of books that spend 1/2 of their time telling you grammar-school level things like "ensure to get a good night's rest before the test." So I bought this one on a whim hoping that I would get lucky since it advertises that the book is for folks like me, good scorers who want to be great scorers.

So I bought this book and my only studying was over the last two and half weeks, 2 hours a day on weekdays and about 4-5 hours a day on each Sat and each Sun. Included in there were my taking several complete practice tests (including the two that [...] gives you for free when you register for the test and one out of another book's GMAT CD). I simply hammered through GMAT 800 book, from front to back, about 50 pages a day, until I was done, and took a practice test every 4 days (not taking the writing portion).

Well, guess what? Today I walked out of a GMAT testing center with a 750.

I really like how the book is layed out. Briefly introduces the advanced topic, and then gives each a clear example problem, several practice problems, and finally, crystal-clear explainations of the solutions for each problem. There is also plenty of page space to write notes and to do math on, without seeing the answer before you are ready. It is just great.

I agree with an earlier reviewer, this book does not cover a few math topics, including combinations or permutations or interest, but I used an additional resource to bone up on those three easily. Including these three items in GMAT 800 would make a 9.9 product into a 10.

Thank you GMAT 800!

I got this book to get some extra practice on the problems on the test -- particularly Math section. For a book that differentiates itself with the "800" moniker, I felt the problems were WAY too easy for this level. I'd hate to see what the regular book is like. It didn't even deal with what are considered the hardest problems on the test -- probability and permutations & combinations. So I'd recommend this book ONLY to people who want some basic extra problems, and forgoe the regular Kaplan books altogether (although I haven't read them, and this book does NOT give any overview of math topics). You're way better off getting the official guides.

If you want a serious preparation, this book is the best in the market. I suggest you buy the Kaplan premier program first, do the practice tests and then feel the need for some advanced material and then look out for this one.

The key is, after going through the initial preparation material say, Kaplan's Premier program for around 2/3 weeks, you will feel that something more is required to take you towards the advanced stage that can give you a boost, an edge, some extra climb in the GMAT score. Then comes this book. It requires 2 weeks of rigorous preparation time. The verbal section of this book (more so for Critical Reasoning and Sentence Correction) is simply superb.

However, do not forget that the last 2 weeks of your preparation should be solely focussed with the OG and other OG supplements (e.g. Verbal OG etc).

If I would not have had this book, my score would have been 20-40 points lower than my actual 700.

I recently took the LSAT and began studying for that test using Kaplan materials but quickly noticed how absurd some of Kaplan's advice was, not to mention the fact that their made-up questions were way out in left field. Despite Kaplan's claim that they make-up these ridiculous questions in order to over-prepare the test-taker, in reality Kaplan does this because they are too cheap to pay LSAC to use actual LSAT questions and this is the best they could do. When I saw little improvement in my practice test scores I decided to invest in the Powerscore Bibles since they use actual LSAT questions and I immediately noticed a difference in my practice test scores and ultimately did well on the LSAT.

I've decided to take the GMAT so that I can pursue a dual JD/MBA and, since I didn't learn my lesson last time, I purchased Kaplan's GMAT 800. The only value I got out of this book was where Kaplan would point out the most commonly tested errors of a particular section of the test. It isn't that the questions are difficult, they aren't really, it's that they are poorly constructed and don't really resemble those written by the GMAC.

While going over GMAC's Official Guide 11, I realized that I needed help with the sentence correction questions so I bought Powerscore's Sentence Correction Bible, which was fantastic. Fortunately, I still have Powerscore's Logical Reasoning Bible so I can use that to prepare for the Critical Reasoning section and a math degree that'll come in handy with the quant section.

This test is too important to waste your time and money on Kaplan's GMAT 800. I'm obviously fond of Powerscore but unfortunately they don't offer a comprehensive study guide so it can get expensive...but you get what you pay for.

I used this book, along with Kaplan's GMAT Prep 2006, and found that this is a good supplemental book but should not be used as your primary GMAT resource. It doesn't contain an introduction to the GMAT or any information about the structure of the test or how it is scored; it is just a large book of practice problems. It also does provide some strategies for attacking problems, but it assumes that you already know Kaplan's basic methods, so if you are using this to supplement the official guide or another resource, you may become confused. Additionally, there is absolutely no information on the writing section of the GMAT, and it would have been helpful and appropriate for the book to include examples of `6' essays.

I did think the problems were as or more difficult than most I received on the GMAT (and I scored in the 99th percentile, so I did get the hardest problems on the test). However, all the problems you receive are in the book and there is no online or computer resource to go along with this, so you won't get the experience of doing difficult problems in a GMAT-like setting. Additionally, some of the problems found here repeat themselves in Kaplan's other resources (especially in the practice tests for the main Kaplan prep book). Despite the book's flaws, I felt prepared for the GMAT using only this and main Kaplan prep book, so I consider it to be an effective resource.

I think this book gives a good overview of the main concepts. This book needs to be completed after you have other GMAT materials, e.g. Kaplat GMAT guide, the Official GMAT Review. The quantitative section covers many of the questions that are very similar to the ones you see in the actual GMAT. These tough questions in quant really helps. The quant questions in the actual GMAT are much harder than the practice questions in official review. However this book covers many of the tougher questions.

Well this book has by far got the difficult most questions you'll ever come across..However dont start off your GMAT preperation with this book, otherwise you would completely feel completely de-motivated..
All in all good questions!!