What GMAT review book did you find most helpful?
I'm looking for a good GMAT review book or books that will give me a good realistic preview of the test. I'm looking for one that have sample questions that are the same difficulty level or harder than the test. I dont want this thing to blindside me and I have NO idea what to expect
Also, did you pass the first time you took it?
I think the third writer more or less has it right, but let me add a few points.
First, make sure to get all three GMAT Official Guides. There is the general one, and then the smaller ones for quant and verbal. They each have different questions, and you need to get as many as possible. Download the GMAT Prep software. It's two real CAT tests, and its free from MBA.com.
Second, I like the Manhattan GMAT books, but they are a bit thin (but still better than a lot of other stuff I read, and for sure better than Kaplan, PR, etc. I just wish they were longer). If you want to dive in more deeply, Veritas has a book on advanced math that was useful, and Powerscore has books on sentence correction and critical reasoning that helped me. If you are looking for scores above 650, those are great additions to what you have been recommended already.
April 8th, 2008 at 5:50 am
I found that when I took both the GMAT and LSAT, it was helpful to use several books and look at the intersections among them as being the most important factors. I used Barrons, Kaplan, and Princeton Review. None of them was perfect, but when I looked at the things that all three covered, I did fine. The GMAT isn't a matter of passing or failing, but a matter of the score fitting the profile of the types of school you want to go to. I only took it once and got into my first choice school. In hindsight, I could have done better if I had spent a little more time studying, especially refreshing my mathematical knowledge - I only spent a couple of hours on it overall.
References :
April 8th, 2008 at 6:29 am
You will not find a perfect book out there. I never took the test, but I have been tutoring and teaching the course for two years. I am creating my own problems and my students usually by the end of the tutoring sessions, they end up solving 1500 math problems. ALL of them their scores get really improved. They came to me after they went through those GMAT tutoring companies such as The Princeton Review, Veritas, Manhatan, nad the like. Those companies are for business only and not for education. Keep that in mind. With enough practice you should be fine. You need to refresh your mathematical knowledge about the subject and learn all those shortcuts. I hope that this was helpful .
References :
April 8th, 2008 at 7:02 am
Hi, I took the GMAT and scored in the 700s (what you'll need for a top b-school). I went through every resource imaginable. I even run a website which has a library of free GMAT questions ( http://www.testsandtutors.com ).
Let me tell you, there are only two brands of study guides that you'll need: The Official Guide, and all of Manhattan GMAT's books.
The Official Guide series is important because it contains actual GMAT questions produced by GMAC, the authors of the GMAT exam.
The Manhattan GMAT series is a must-have because they go into way better detail on the mechanics of problem-solving than any other brand. Forget about Kaplan, Princeton Review, Arco or any other GMAT book brand. In my opinion, their books fail to categorize questions as smartly as Manhattan GMAT's . The mediocre brands I just listed typically publish three types of books: verbal review, quant review, and verbal plus quant together. Manhattan GMAT actually produces books on specific portions of the test: books entirely written on critical reading, sentence correction, geometry, number properties, etc. For every minute section you'll need to know on the GMAT, Manhattan GMAT has produced a book. This is why they set the standard.
Secondly, I found that the practice exam CDs that Arco, Princeton Review and Kaplan provided with their books did not accurately predict my GMAT score. The exams that you can purchase online at Manhattan GMAT were actually very accurate.
Hope this helps and you get a great score.
References :
http://www.testsandtutors.com
April 9th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
you might want to try out the study guide from Morrison Media… they do a thorough job with their study guides and accompanying materials….
http://www.mcssl.com/app/aftrack.asp?AFID=243463&u=www.gmat-secrets.com
References :
April 10th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
I think the third writer more or less has it right, but let me add a few points.
First, make sure to get all three GMAT Official Guides. There is the general one, and then the smaller ones for quant and verbal. They each have different questions, and you need to get as many as possible. Download the GMAT Prep software. It's two real CAT tests, and its free from MBA.com.
Second, I like the Manhattan GMAT books, but they are a bit thin (but still better than a lot of other stuff I read, and for sure better than Kaplan, PR, etc. I just wish they were longer). If you want to dive in more deeply, Veritas has a book on advanced math that was useful, and Powerscore has books on sentence correction and critical reasoning that helped me. If you are looking for scores above 650, those are great additions to what you have been recommended already.
References :
730 on the GMAT