Customer Reviews

Princeton Review: Cracking the GRE CAT, 2000 Edition

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(1)
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2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Compared with other current GRE reference books (ETS powerprep: 5 stars, Kaplan's GRE: 4 stars), this GRE book seems to be just one star. Clumsy composition and the author spreaded just one GRE practical test for the large volume of the book. Enclosed CD will also make you disappointed. Totally different styled background format from official GRE test and IF YOU QUIT THE TEST BY MISTAKE, YOU CAN NEVER ACCESS THE TEST PART AGAIN. Stupid software! Don't spend the money for this book. ETS Powerprep will be enough for high score.

Do not buy this book! I repeat, do not buy this book! I just took the GRE yesterday, and I did score good on the Math and Analytical sections, but when it came to the Verbal, FORGET IT! How can one person score in the 600's in two sections, then turn around get a 350 on the verbal. I studied for around 2 months, and safe to say I was very disappointed in my scores. I feel I am starting all over again, since I am going to buy a different book this time (GRE for dummies sounds very promising). Also there were so many typos, that I couldn't believe that this book was not better profread. No offense, but this an extremly important test, decides whether or not you even go to Grad School, so you would figure being so "Helpful," they would at least have the decency to make sure all information was correct! So I am disappointed, and don't have $100 dollars to waste on a test I have to take again, and hopefully the next time I am giving a review, I can give a positive review!

I purchased this book (w/CD-ROM version) 14 days prior to taking the GRE along with the fact that I've been out of college for many years, I considered my self to be handicapped at standardized test taking. I found the sections on verbal and computational to be the most helpful, while the section on analytical was just OK. The CD-ROM was helpful in developing a feel for timing, which helped reduce "panicking" on test day. For what it worth, my CD-ROM had some problems and the folks at Princeton Review's Tech support were not that helpful. The end result, were scores in "admirable" range, not only due to some of the techniques I learned in this book, but taking practice tests on a daily basis, sometimes to the point of absurdity.

On the basis of the first review above, and a letter from Amazon, I bought this book thinking it had a cd version of the test. Mine, at least, did not have any software. I live overseas and am stuck with it (it took a month to arrive) but don't buy this book if you are looking for practice. They also have a few details wrong about how the test operates (exiting the section does not cancel your score)

The contents of the book seem adequate but the included software is very buggy on Windows 95.

I found the book to be helpful in preparing for the format and the content (to an extent) of the test. I found the practice tests both in the book and with the CD to be very helpful. I did not have any problems with the software. The vocabulary words were not as helpful as I had hoped but the 'tricks' provided to analyze words even when you don't know them really helped me to get the score I needed the first time taking the test. Of course I did not see any exact questions or math problems on the test as in the practice, but the examples provided helped enough to solve most of them. The key is actually going through and doing the practice problems and understanding the concept of them. KNOW THE VOCABULARY and probably get additional words from another source prior to taking your GRE.