Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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1,183 of 1,190 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Must Have, January 29, 2006
The secret for the GMAT is practice and stamina.
For my own preparation, I used The Princeton Review, Kaplan's Book and ETS' The Official Guide for GMAT Review.
I will go through the advantages and disadvantages of each, and explain why The Official Guide for GMAT Review was the best of the three and why you should give it more time than the others.
Princeton:
Plus
- Good review sections (both quantitative and verbal)
- Practice tests similar to the GMAT
- Online tests are easy to review
- Provides you with a test strategy on how to crack the questions
- Explicitly advises you to practice also with The Official Guide for GMAT Review
Disadvantages
- Does not explain why a choice is wrong
- Not enough practice questions
Kaplan:
Plus
- Good quantitative review sections (appendix was great)
- Interactive software for reviewing the Kaplan GMAT strategies
- Practice tests similar to the GMAT
- Practice tests and sections are difficult, this creates in you a sense of urgency
- Plenty of practice questions
Disadvantages
- The software interface is old and slow, you are left to work with a little box on the screen
- Practice tests and sections' answer choices are not very well explained
- The questions are far fetched and do not fall in the spirit of the GMAT, this might lead you the wrong path
The Official Guide for GMAT Review:
Plus
- More than plenty of practice questions
- You might get the same or similar questions on the GMAT (like I did)
- The practice questions are organized by level of difficulty, the last ones are the most difficult
- Free PowerPrep software that has two practice tests exactly similar to the GMAT in look and feel (free online tests at the mba dot com website http://www.mba.com/mba/TaketheGMAT/Tools/PowerprepSoftware.htm)
- The practice questions reveal actual GMAT test patterns
Disadvantages
- Absence of test taking techniques
- The skills review sections are poor
- Only the last 200 questions in every practice section will be like the ones you will see on the GMAT (unless you perform poorly)
This Official Guide from GMAC should be the cornerstone of your preparation, simply because the questions are from past tests and are very thoroughly researched. This will allow you to develop insight into the test mentality.
Equally important the correct and the wrong answer choices for each question are explained in detail. You will learn the various ways used to lead you in error and consequently, you will develop the feel to spot and eliminate wrong answers.
The rules of grammar on which the GMAT Sentence Correction questions are based are best outlined in this guide. I had a lot of difficulty with the Verbal section until I read through the explanations here.
Overall, this book shows you all the tricks of the GMAT. I did not have bad surprises when I took the actual test; it seemed that I had seen all the questions before.
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109 of 110 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
An absolute must for any GMAT Prep, March 20, 2007
This book, coupled with the Official GMAT Verbal and Quant Review Guides (by the same company, GMAC) is enough to give you a thorough understanding, of the type of questions that can be expected in the GMAT and the reasoning needed to answer them correctly. I found the reasoning provided with each answer, especially useful. Another nice thing about these books is that the questions are arranged in increasing order of difficulty. So, if you find some questions very easy, just jump a few questions forward. The only setback with these books is that they do not give detailed explanations in the 'concepts review sections'.
You will need to turn to other books/websites to get tips and tricks for the exam. I recommend Princeton for this purpose: The Princeton guide gave me very clear and effective test taking strategies that helped me a lot. I highly recommend NOT USING Kaplan, especially to take practice tests. The scoring is very tough, and you are tested in areas that are absolutely unnecessary for the GMAT. Also, very low scores on these tests are discouraging. I highly recommend taking the two Powerprep practice tests available for download from the GMAC website. These tests consist of 'retired' GMAT questions, and are very much identical to the actual GMAT. Your scoring on these tests would be identical to your actual GMAT score.
My practice scores are as below (in chronological order):
Powerprep Test 1: 630 (35 days before my GMAT)
Princeton Test 1: 650
Kaplan Test 1: 600
Princeton Test 2: 670
Princeton Test 3: 700
Princeton Test 4: 720
Kaplan Test 2: 530 (One day before my GMAT - Very, very discouraging!!)
Powerprep Test 2: 750 (One day before my GMAT)
Powerprep Test 3 (Reinstalled): 760 (with some repetitions from Powerprep Test 2)
GMAT: 750 (Verbal 40, Quant 50)
My GMAT Prep consisted of lots and lots of practice, analysis of my practice test results, and noting down where I erred, and making sure that I did not repeat my mistakes.
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84 of 86 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
770 - Essential Resource, February 21, 2008
After 3 months of study, I just took the GMAT last week. This is my first and only attempt at the GMAT-CAT. In fact this is the first standardized test I have taken in 12 years. Overall I am happy with my score (770 Q51 V44).
The only study materials I used were:
- Official 11th Edition
- Official Verbal Review Guide
- Official Quant Review Guide
- Official GMATPrep Software (sent to you once you schedule your test)
- Manhattan GMAT Guides (reviewed for techniques only)
The three official books are the absolute bible for sample problems. I am a firm believer in quality over quantity. I NEVER did any problem that was not provided by the real GMAT company...NONE. Using problems written by other vendors is not needed, and could be counter productive. I would rather fully understand 200 official problems, than slog through 1000 non-official problems.
STUDY TIPS:
- First master all the problems in the printed official guides (11th, Verbal Guide, Quant Guide). NOTE: Getting the correct answer is not the same as "mastering" a question.
- Any problem you miss or find changing, repeat many times (even after you may have memorized the answer). Keep repeating the problems, until the basic skill is fully understood.
- Keep accurate records every time you do a problem (correct / incorrect, easy / challenging / stuck).
- Focus on core concepts. In truth, the GMAT tests very few concepts, but will use these simple building blocks to construct an unlimited number of tricky problems. Know the core concepts, become aware of the tricks, and the rest is timing.
- Only once the printed materials are exhausted (took me about 2 months), then you should "graduate" to the GMATPrep software. This should be used mostly for developing timing skills. In the end, you need to gain the confidence to flex your time during the actual test. You should be able to answer simple questions quickly, so you can invest more time in higher value problems.
This book is not a problem solving technique book. You will not find tips and tricks. Basically this is book should be considered a "question bank". In the quantitative section it will provide the questions and an answer key...period. For the verbal section, it will provide very useful detailed explanations of the correct answers. If you are you looking for a book on techniques, I would recommend the well organized Manhattan book set.
Bottom-line: you need this book for any serious attempt at the GMAT.
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