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I gave GRE in Oct 2013 and ended up with a score of 304 (VA: 147, QA: 157, AW: 3). I am planning to retake in the next 1–2 months. How should I plan and strategize so that I end up with a good score this time? I am basically aiming for an improvement by 20 points at least. Analysis of previous attempt: I can remember the test day very well. One of the reasons for my low score was the bad test center. The test center was noisy with people continuously coming in, going out and passing by. All these things distracted me a lot and pulled down my concentration. The keyboard and mouse were horrible. In Verbal, I normally had difficulty in reading and comprehending texts fast esp. long RCs and the presence of noise in the test center made it all the more difficult. I could not concentrate much while reading long RCs and most of the time, made guess work and moved on to the next question. I didn't know / couldn't recall the meaning of few words which made the Sentence Equivalence and Text Completion questions more difficult and time consuming. In Quans, I got stuck in 2-3 difficult questions initially and lost time I could have otherwise spent for the easy ones. I had to hurry towards the end and missed 1-2 questions. I had expected a 165+ for Quans with my preparation and my mocks from Kaplan but distractions took a toll and I had to read few questions repeatedly. In Analytical Writing, I did take time in understanding the arguments. I faced difficulty in expressing my thoughts in an excellent style. The keyboard was very hard and it was becoming very difficult to type correctly and fast. I could not write my essays to the length I wanted to because I lost a good of time in typing. As a result, I could not even proof read my write-ups. I had prepared from Kaplan GRE Premier 2011-12 ONLY. Did I trust the wrong book? Should I have followed some additional books as well? These questions bothered me just after the exam then in 2013 and still bothering me now when I am yet to start my preparation. I got to improve my ability to read and understand difficult and complex RCs fast. How can I do this? I don't have much time to prepare and want to go with a self-preparation plan. How do I prepare efficiently? Where should I focus? I would request experts and fellows to help me out urgently.

I'm done with the GRE and scored a 334 overall(Q-169,V-165) My target was to score 330+ and hell yeah I'm happy! I'm targeting all the top schools for computer science on the west coast- CalTech, Stanford,UCLA,UC Berkley,USC . Although there are a couple of top computer science schools on the east coast but i want to study in and around the silicon valley where all the action in computer science is so that's why west coast schools are my priority! How I went about my preparation Since I'm studying in a top enginering school in India,GRE Math seemed liked a cakewalk and frankly speaking,I didn't study for it much I just brushed up my basics but did a lot of practice. GRE Math: The GRE Math questions are from high school. The difficult ones are a bit tricky but if you get familiar with the types of questions that are tested,you shouldn't have much difficulty. GRE Verbal: GRE Verbal was a tough nut to crack though. I've not been into the habit of reading much and had to practice a lot from different books. I primarily used 3 sources- Princetons' Crack the GRE, GRE Official Guide and GRE Verbal Grail. Here's what I think about these books Princeton's Crack the GRE book- The book is good for basics and for giving you an overview but not much beyond that. I guess it's written for people who are looking at average scores otherwise it's of not much help. So for my verbal prep, I primarily relied on the ETS Official Guide and GRE Verbal Grail. ETS OG- The good thing about the official guide is that the verbal questions in it are quite tricky especially the text completion ones. The bad thing is that there aren't many practice questions. GRE Verbal Grail- Probably the best book for verbal. I especially liked its reading comprehension section as each question type has been dealt quite well and given that around half of the questions on the GRE Verbal are RC questions, you should really be able to nail the questions. The book provides a lot of practice questions too. Vocabulary: I kept on working on my vocabulary and would daily learn around 10 new words. What I didn't do is start practicing TC and SE questions alongwith learning vocabulary. I firstly wanted to be good enough at vocab before attempting these questions. Once I had some confidence in vocab, then I started attempting questions from the ETS OG and GRE Verbal Grail book. I'd do a block of 20 questions from the books,then analyze them and then write down the new words that I learnt. This really helped me master vocab to a great extent. GRE Test day: The actual test was not very much different from the ETS OG practice tests.Both the verbal and the quant sections were quite close and I think that doing quite a few practice tests actually made me quite comfortable on the GRE day. My advice to the fellow GRE aspirants: 1. Learning vocabulary becomes an interesting process if you use the words in your daily life. The more you use the words the better you will be able to understand the context 2. Learning the strategies for various RC questions is very important. If you don't know the strategies, you may end up taking more time than required on a question 3. It's all about practice. I think that GRE is quite an interesting exam and can be cracked if you practice well. That is really the key to success 4. Analyze your practice tests really well. There's no point in taking the tests if you are not analyzing them properly. Lastly, if I can get a good score , i see no reason why you guys can't. A good GRE score comes with hardwork but is something you can definitely achieve if you prepare well.

Hey folks, I have planned to take up TOEFL test on Aug 29,2015 and GRE in the month of October. Currently, I'm working for an IT Company . I have just started my preparation. The resources that i have are ETS official book for GRE and TOEFL. Also, I have ordered for Manhattan's 5 lb GRE practice problems. I understand that I have a short span of time and amidst my work, its little hard for me to prepare. I'm looking for European Universities and hence I have decided to take TOEFL first and then GRE. Im interested to pursue MS in Embedded Systems/ MS in Electrical in a good European University with full scholarship. Suggest me some good study plans and help me to crack these exams to pursue my dream. Looking forward for your tips guys. :)

There is an algebraic approach to this problem and a "pick your own numbers approach." I went with the pick-your-own-numbers approach but I got the wrong answer by choosing x=2 and the right answer if x=3 Here's the question: The base of a rectangle is length x and the perimeter is 10, which of the following represents the rectangle's area? [a] 10-x^2 x(5-x) [c,d,e] The correct answer is x(5-x) but if I choose x=2 then options A and B work. Here are my questions: Is there any "rule" that would make me not pick x=2 for the base on a rectangle? (Does the base have to be greater than the height? I couldn't find any formal rule about that) If we use the pick-you-own-numbers approach, I guess it's true we MUST always check every answer choice right? If we get 2 answers that give the same result we then have to use different numbers. Does anyone have any insights about picking-your-own-numbers on a problem like this? Thank you so much I look forward to helping you!