The Power Of PowerPrep GMAT Practice Tests

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While test prep company tests can be very good for practice and while one can learn much from them, in order to get optimal practice, many people would still rather use as many official practice tests as possible.

There are currently available only four GMAT Prep tests, and while repeating them once each can be OK, repeating them is not optimal, and retaking them more than once is a path to practice test score inflation and the problems associated with it. In this blog post, I went into detail regarding those issues.

https://infinitemindprep.com/resetting-a ... et-smoked/

So how can one get more official practice tests? Use PowerPrep, the practice test software that came out before GMAT Prep.

Yes, PowerPrep does not include an IR section, but let's face it, IR is a low priority and leaving it out of a practice test early in one's preparation is not really a significant. Neither is not taking all four sections. I realize that people want to as closely as possible duplicate the full test experience, but if you really plan on taking all four GMAT Prep tests anyway, you will get enough of that.

So what's PowerPrep good for?

PowerPrep is good for a second or third practice test. Probably one should use a GMAT Prep test as one's first practice test, in order to get an accurate sense of what the test is like and what one needs to work on in order to achieve one's score goal. Then a week or two later, as one is preparing one can use PowerPrep for the second practice test, and then, possibly, for a third test.

From what I have seen the biggest issue in PowerPrep is that the SC questions are more idiom based than current questions. If you are aware of that, you can take it into account. Other than that, PowerPrep is pretty tight and rather well matches the actual GMAT tests given today.

Also, PowerPrep contains many questions that also appear in the three Official Guides. Great, that tends to indicate that PowerPrep is still relevant today. Meanwhile, by using PowerPrep early in your preparation, you can take the tests without having already seen many of the questions via use of an OG.

So if you want some more official practice at playing the GMAT video game, using PowerPrep could be a great way to get it.

PowerPrep can be downloaded via the links on this page.

https://gmatclub.com/forum/gmat-prep-pow ... 77548.html
Last edited by MartyMurray on Sun May 08, 2016 5:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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by Musicat » Thu May 05, 2016 11:08 pm
Thanks for this, helps alot.
I've been scrapping together various study materials and checking which ones have the best material for me specially, connecting the best bits and kinda creating my own study material that reflects to my plans. Makes life a bit easier this way and my studying is more precise as i can scratch away something i don't necessarily need that badly. This way i have more time to study my areas of weakness.

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by DavidG@VeritasPrep » Fri May 06, 2016 5:56 am
One small addendum to Marty's always-sage advice: GMAC released a couple more practice tests recently, so now there are a total of 6 official tests: 2 free and 4 more you can purchase.
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by prada » Sun May 08, 2016 1:42 pm
Is it me or the link doesnt work? It goes to some gorilla test prep as though the domain doesn't exist?

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by MartyMurray » Sun May 08, 2016 5:52 pm
I guess Gorilla Test Prep no longer exists.

If you do an internet search, you will find where on GMAT Club to download PowerPrep.

Also, I changed the link in the post above.
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by sanghaha » Fri Oct 21, 2016 3:20 am
Hi Marty, silly sounding question, but how did you get those to run on Windows 7+?
I am using Windows 8 and am unable to run those Powerprep tests. Compatibility mode does not seem to work too.

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by MartyMurray » Fri Oct 21, 2016 3:57 am
sanghaha wrote:Hi Marty, silly sounding question, but how did you get those to run on Windows 7+?
I am using Windows 8 and am unable to run those Powerprep tests. Compatibility mode does not seem to work too.
Hi sanghaha.

Not a silly question.

I think they incompatible with any Windows version after 7.(Actually sanghaha got it to work. See how in a post below.)

Too bad. They are good tests.
Last edited by MartyMurray on Sun Nov 06, 2016 5:21 am, edited 2 times in total.
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by sanghaha » Sun Nov 06, 2016 2:44 am
Marty Murray wrote:
sanghaha wrote:Hi Marty, silly sounding question, but how did you get those to run on Windows 7+?
I am using Windows 8 and am unable to run those Powerprep tests. Compatibility mode does not seem to work too.
Hi sanghaha.

Not a silly question.

I think they incompatible with any Windows version after 7, and if there is a way to make them work with later versions, I am not aware of it.

Too bad. They are good tests.
Hey Marty, I actually still managed to get it to work on windows 8. Wanted to put it on here in case someone finds themselves in the same position.

The test was great practice - really representative of the right GMAT level as you said Marty. However, I had seen a few of the CR questions at some point or the other and resulted in massive score inflation - V45 with 770. In any case I am not reading into this too much.

PS: People looking to get this working can reach out to me and I would be happy to guide.

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by MartyMurray » Sun Nov 06, 2016 4:17 am
sanghaha wrote:Hey Marty, I actually still managed to get it to work on windows 8. Wanted to put it on here in case someone finds themselves in the same position.

The test was great practice - really representative of the right GMAT level as you said Marty. However, I had seen a few of the CR questions at some point or the other and resulted in massive score inflation - V45 with 770. In any case I am not reading into this too much.

PS: People looking to get this working can reach out to me and I would be happy to guide.
Grrreat.

Maybe you could provide here a brief outline of what you did to get it to work. I am curious myself, and this information would be useful to many people.
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by sanghaha » Sun Nov 06, 2016 4:43 am
Sure Marty.

The gist of it is available at this link: https://lifehacker.com/5965889/how-to-ru ... -windows-8

Effectively you're running a virtual Windows XP inside your Windows 8 OS. There are programs that facilitate this. I used a program called VirtualBox.

After doing this and transferring your Powerprep setup into the XP (virtual) machine, you run the setup as you would normally and it installs alright. The screen might appear too small so change your computer's resolution to 800x600.

Overall quite a detour from my GMAT preparation, but the amazing Powerprep tests were worth the 1.5 hours I spent to get this right.

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by MartyMurray » Sun Nov 06, 2016 5:14 am
sanghaha wrote:Sure Marty.

The gist of it is available at this link: https://lifehacker.com/5965889/how-to-ru ... -windows-8

Effectively you're running a virtual Windows XP inside your Windows 8 OS. There are programs that facilitate this. I used a program called VirtualBox.

After doing this and transferring your Powerprep setup into the XP (virtual) machine, you run the setup as you would normally and it installs alright. The screen might appear too small so change your computer's resolution to 800x600.

Overall quite a detour from my GMAT preparation, but the amazing Powerprep tests were worth the 1.5 hours I spent to get this right.
Excellent. I am guessing that something similar could be done in Windows 10.

Big win!
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