Customer Reviews

McGraw-Hill's GRE with CD-ROM, 2009 Edition (Mcgraw-Hill's Gre (Book & CD-Rom))

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This book is riddled with errors - some typos, miscalculations in math sections, and some totally wrong answers. In addition, the questions are pretty basic. Other books I have looked at give you more difficult questions, which in my opinion, is far more helpful. I checked this book out from the library. I'm just using it for practice on the writing portion by looking at their essay prompts.

For the most part, this was a decent and comprehensive study guide, like a lot of guides for the GRE. It covers all parts of the test and how to answer each question type. For the analytical writing section, I especially like that it had examples of essays that were graded 6, 4, and 2, so that I could get a good idea of where my writing was. I also liked that it had 1 pre-test, and 3 practice tests at the end, because when it comes down to it, you need to practice taking as many timed tests as you can. Some other books have a lot of drills, but don't put them in the test format.

However, the GLARING problem that really brought this down was the numerous mistakes in the math section. Not just one or two, but enough to be really frustrating. Most of these mistakes were due to the answer explanations answering a slightly different problem. For example, on page 294, column A has 11/2 (eleven over two). But, in the explanation on page 308, column A is 1 and 1/2 (1.5). But then the last sentence of the explanation says "Thus the quantity in Column B (5/3) is greater than the quantity in Column A (11/2)." ! ! !

In another example, on page 203, question 5 asks what is the median of: 80, 27, 19, 82, 15, 72, 3. If you put those in order than 27 is the median. But the answer on page 208 says it is 45.5, because it only lists 3, 15, 19, 72, 80, 82. It left out 27.

You can check those out yourself, and there are many more like them. It is clear that the editors did not do a thorough job. I found that very disheartening, so I hope the next edition corrects these kinds of problems.

I wish I hadn't wasted my money on this and wasted so much time working through it. Like the other reviewers noted, there are so many errors and typos that I'm shocked it passed through the publishing house. McGraw-Hill should have to issue a refund to all of the people who purchased it. Additionally, the questions are simplistic to the point where it does not adequately prepare readers for the actual test. The software provided is also faulty; I received an 800 on one of the practice verbal sections and it recorded my score in the "Performance Summary" as a 780.

I really liked Princeton Review's Cracking the GRE much better. It had more challenging material and fewer errors.

Ok book overall, but really not very insightful, no shortcuts, just simple math everyone already knows how to do. And lots of simple errors to boot. Lame.

The first clue that this book is a miserable excuse for a GRE prep-book is that all of the practice tests have the wrong time limit on the Math section. It's clear the authors have not adequately researched the GRE exam. In addition to the errors contained in the book, the level of difficulty of the questions is SIGNIFICANTLY lower than Kaplan, Princeton Review, and the ETS official preparation materials. The practice exams and scores are not an accurate reflection of how you will do on the GRE. Save yourself money and time and DO NOT buy this book. Kaplan and my personal favorite, Priceton Review, are far superior.

The others have said it all: this publication is full of errors. But if you're still considering a purchase, let me drive home one more point. The author(s) of this guide aren't only careless (in that they make errors), but in cases where they don't even know how to answer a question, they're actually daring enough to attempt to get by with absolutely stupid answers. A case in point on page 138 will show you exactly what attitude they're displaying. The question reads:

If -7<=x<=5, and -3<=y<=4, what is the greatest possible value of (y-x)(x+y)?

And here goes the 'answer' found on page 139: use x=5 and y=4 to get x+y=9, and x=-7 and y=4 to get y-x=11. The greatest value is therefore 99. Excuse me? So does an 'x' mean an 'x'? I can't imagine even a prep school kid committing this kind of 'error'. Can't help but think the authors have no clue how to answer the question and what they did instead is to BS us.

[BTW, the clue is to realize that (y-x)(x+y)= y(sq) - x(sq). ]

First off, I rarely write a negative review for a product. However, this is by far the worst review book that I have ever seen.

I recently acquired this book for a quick review of upcoming GRE exam. Unfortunately, there are some serious flaws with this review book: (1) I found so many mistakes all over the book, from exercise to actual practice exams. (By the way, there are more mistakes in math than verbal). To be more precise, there are three practice exams, and all three math answer keys contain mistakes. (2) Some of the questions have very poor wording...

Anyway, if you happen to get a lower-than-expect math score on its practice exam, be sure to double-check the answer(s). It is very likely that the answer key was wrong to begin with...

FYI, McGraw-Hill publishing company will not refund money, unless you order the book directly from them. Otherwise, you will have to take it back to the location of initial purchase.

I don't understand how could this book be released. Many students build up their confidence by taking practice exams from review books. Unfortunately, this book actually breaks students' confidence...

Do not buy this book! The number of errors is unreal, at least one per section. The anwer keys don't match up with question explanations. This is definitely NOT a confidence-builder, which is what I need prior to taking the GRE.

The above review comments on the number of mathematical errors in this edition, but there are a number of glaring and unnacceptable verbal mistakes in here as well.

For example, in one antonym question, they ask "The opposite of deplorable is: a)eligible, b)acceptable, c)irreproachable, d) reprehensible, or e) intractable?

The answer key informs us that the answer is not in fact c (as one might guess) but instead b, because, "The word deplorable is used to describe something that is bad or 'worthy of reproach.' Therefore, something that is deplorable would most likely not be acceptable (b)."

It would almost be funny if it weren't so frustrating, misleading, and retarded.

SERIOUSLY, WHO WROTE THIS BOOK?