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1410 GRE - 790Q 620V - and it WAS harder


akbar

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The verbal section is unimportant for my grad program, although I thought it was easier than Powerprep, especially the analogies and opposites questions. I didn't study the verbal at all in my prep, so it didn't really matter to me what I got.

 

The quantitative section was more difficult than PowerPrep. The first question was quite tricky, and because of the high difficulty of the first five questions I was nervous for the rest of the section, trying to convince myself that maybe it was just experimental. As I had anticipated it being experimental, I did not use all of my scratch paper, figuring I would need it for the real quants section, so I was very cramped and may have made some basic math errors. I also didn't know you have to use their pencils; I'm accustomed to doing it in pen.

 

I'm accustomed to working very fast through PowerPrep(around 1 minute per problem), so I was shocked to find I had spent 3-4 minutes working at the first question. I managed to finish with about three minutes to spare, but I usually finish PowerPrep and other tests with ten minutes left, so it was quite scary.

 

On my test, there were a lot of basic statistics questions, but none about probability. The geometry questions were quite complex, and more tricky than PowerPrep tests. There were also some tricky number theory and number sequence questions, but nothing harder than the hardest PowerPrep questions. What bugs me is not the difficulty of individual questions, but how many difficult questions I got, especially right at the beginning - and what's more, they were all of the type I find most difficult - number theory and sequences! The first five were very tough, harder than PowerPrep, and I got more difficult questions on this test overall than on PowerPrep.

 

The 790 comes as quite a shock to me; I did PowerPrep four times and got an 800 each time with plenty of time to spare(and the tests were pretty different each time). I also did Kaplan, scoring 750 - 800 as I got better. I was scoring at 770 on the online Princeton Review tests. I did both of GRE_Kickboxer's 7-question tests in about 10-11 minutes each, with no cheating.

 

I got an identified research essay writing section, which was fun, but I was pretty dejected because I knew my "experimental" quant section was the real one.

 

My nerves were pretty bad during the test - if I hadn't been so stressed, I might have been able to think more clearly. What really stressed me was, again, the difficulty of the first five.

 

I know my account differs from those who say the test is no harder than PP, but I'm guessing individual tests can differ a lot in difficulty, especially in problems that you think are hard. I guess I just got a lot of question types that I happen not to be very good at, and very early in the test too.

 

Also, I have no idea if this had any effect on my test, but in the background questions section, I didn't really read the directions and assumed they were asking where I wanted to send my scores to, so I picked a very tough program at one of my "dream schools." Could it be possible you get a harder test depending on where you say you're from?

 

Oh well - I'm not going to retake it for 10 extra points, and especially not with the new fill-in-the-blank types, so let's hope the adcoms don't discriminate between 790 and 800 too much. The difference is supposed to be statistically insignificant, eh?

 

My advice: Don't go in thinking it'll be just as easy as PowerPrep, and definitely never assume one section is the experimental one. Your test might very well be as easy as PP, but there is a chance that it will be harder. Don't freak out if the first few questions are hard - they ended up getting easier(because I got them wrong, I guess, but I've heard eventually you get easier/less time-consuming problems later along the line). Good luck everyone.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Just to confirm my belief that there are harder and easier versions of the test, I got my score report and I didn't get a single level 3 difficulty question! The test was entirely level 4's and 5's from the very beginning. I missed 6 questions, but still got 790 (on quants). I guess if you get an "easier" test(more 3's and 2's) you can't miss as much, whereas if you get a "harder" test you're allowed to miss more.

 

For comparison, my verbal section started with a level 2, and slowly ramped up through 3, 4, and 5.

 

Good luck everyone who has yet to take the GRE.

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