660 (q-49, V-31)

[Falconfan82]

First time I took the GMAT. Put in about 70 hours of study time over a span of 3 weeks, using solely OG11. By the time I had completed solving and reviewing every problem on OG11, I realized that I had to take the test the following day. I didn't have any time to take any practice tests and I didn't feel like burning myself out the night before the test so I basically went in there taking comfort in the fact the problems would be similar to the ones on OG11.

Boy was I wrong. The test was unbelievably hard...especially the quantitative part. I went in there assuming that I could get some easy quantitative problems that I could breeze through, giving me some extra time to work on harder problems. The thing was, this darned thing wasn't givning me any gimmes. None. Nada. The first 5 problems took like 15 minutes to work on and I was in full panic mode. The difficulty of the exam was nothing like I had ever imagined.

Took a break after the quantitative. Went to the restroom thinking "oh my god should I cancel this thing?" About 5 minutes later, I started working on the verbal section. I thought the sentence corrections were rather easy but I had A LOT of problems with CR and RC. One curveball after another. Staring at the computer screen for 4 hours wasn't helping my cause and at that point I was just thinking about ending this bad boy so that I could just cancel it and walk out. I had about a minute to go with 5 problems remaining so I pretty had to guess for those.

When I was done with the exam, I spent good 5 minutes debating whether I should cancel the score and somehow came to a conclusion that I should at least see what I got. I was pleasantly surprised when I saw 660. What was more surprising was that I got a 49 on quantitative. I got manhandled on verbal as i expected.

If there is one thing that I learned from this experience, it's that I should have definitely done some practice tests under real test settings, giving me a good idea of how the testing environment would be. I also realized that the level of problems on OG 11, especially the quantitative part was much easier than that of the real test. I wouldn't say OG11 is a waste but it definitely didn't prep me for the exam as the difficulty of the real exam just took me by surprise. I definitely underestimated the difficulty of the exam.

For the next exam, I plan on purchasing the Kaplan book since it is regarded as having the hardest problems. Any tips/advice would be much appreciated. My goal is to break 700, and I feel that given enough practice, it's not an unrealistic goal.

[surya167]

Simple one liner for you "Give it again"

[jordan23VT]

I would recommend gmatprep and powerprep, followed by the gmatsets 21-31....and you should knock the test out...

did you feel the RC, CR, SC were much more difficult in comparasion to OG11?

[donkey_man_88]

Kaplan 800 is a breeze as well. Do what ShakeVT suggests.

[Falconfan82]

Thank you for your replies. I wouldn't say that the verbal part was siginificantly harder than that of OG11 solely in terms of difficulty. The problems were seemed to very much solvable but my biggest problem was that I was spending way too much time on the problems which forced me to randomly guess for the last 5 questions or so. (Thus bringing my verbal score to a measly 31) I could definitely use a book that teaches me some short cuts and strategies to save time. It wouldn't also hurt to build some stamina and be more prepared to stare at the computer for 4 hours either.

As for math, I feel that OG11 had me totally underestimating the section as I was stumped by the difficulty of a lot of problems. I have no idea how I pulled off a 49 but I need a book that closely reflects the real test problems.

I will definitely check out the books that ShakeVT suggests to prepare myself much better for the next time out. If you guys could recommend any other books that can help me with the "real thing," I would very much appreciate it. Thanks guys.

[sandeep_chads]

Good Job buddy on the score... INSEAD had a median of around 700 last year. ( "May not be authentic info." )

If you have a good profile, then I guess you should count your chances in.

Where can I find sets 21 to 31 ?

[donkey_man_88]

Thank you for your replies. I wouldn't say that the verbal part was siginificantly harder than that of OG11 solely in terms of difficulty. The problems were seemed to very much solvable but my biggest problem was that I was spending way too much time on the problems which forced me to randomly guess for the last 5 questions or so. (Thus bringing my verbal score to a measly 31) I could definitely use a book that teaches me some short cuts and strategies to save time. It wouldn't also hurt to build some stamina and be more prepared to stare at the computer for 4 hours either.

As for math, I feel that OG11 had me totally underestimating the section as I was stumped by the difficulty of a lot of problems. I have no idea how I pulled off a 49 but I need a book that closely reflects the real test problems.

I will definitely check out the books that ShakeVT suggests to prepare myself much better for the next time out. If you guys could recommend any other books that can help me with the "real thing," I would very much appreciate it. Thanks guys.

Manhattan Sentence Correction Guide. Also download 1000 CR questions from score top. Do the last 10 questions in each section. The OG Verbal review is also good.

[Falconfan82]

I posted this message on the other board and I was hoping you guys could help me with this as well. Thanks in advance!

Message:
I took the GMAT last Friday (4/6) and to my surprise, the official score was already available this afternoon (4/10). Does that mean that the schools that I picked to send the scores to received the official scores as well? My understanding is that it generally takes about 3 weeks for the official score to become available and be sent to schools. Am I missing something? Do the test takers usually get the scores first and do the schools receive them 3 weeks later? Any help would be appreciated. Thanks a lot!