GMAT Strategy

This is my first experience with MGMAT .
yesterday i had given it's free practice test...

almost 60 percent quant ques were out of level..u can never see so many hard questions at a single time and that too in series...
though i finished it in time..

verbal is useless...
could not be sure with the explantions of around 5 ques that they had given..
5 ques had given so much ambiguity so as to interpret..
RC's were pretty easy to comprehend ..but again they had given choices whcih were almost alike..u can easily pick out that two or three of them satisfies the condition..they had gone for one of them..
could not finish in time...
last ques....who the hell had designed the explanation..he had not gone for original answer because it was wordy...lugubrious....
far away from actual GMAT ....

i think the princeton exams are far better then that of MGMAT...


SCORE: Q=46. V=29. OA:630..

pls avoid MGMAT..

Dude, for my GMAt retake I will be relying on MGMAT tests only.
I took 2 of them before my previous attempt.
Ended with 670 and 720. Boy, they drain you out.

I will prefer to drain myself on this practice tests than to drain myself on the Actual GMAT.

yeah, I agree quant is a little above the GMAT level.
But I found verbal quite decent.

how much did u score on gmat prep?

We should avoid such hard language on this forum. I understand that you're frustrated about your results, but that doesn't mean that MGMAT is an absolute waste of time. If you'll check out "Best practice tests" poll, you'll see it's currently in the lead.

DanaJ wrote:We should avoid such hard language on this forum. I understand that you're frustrated about your results, but that doesn't mean that MGMAT is an absolute waste of time. If you'll check out "Best practice tests" poll, you'll see it's currently in the lead.

I think the MGMAT test deserves even more harsh word, I dont think the guy is frustrated with result but with approch of mgmat..my full sympathy with him/her...

coming back to how cra** is the mgmat, I am retaking these tests these days again, and in my last tests there were 3 questions in verbal where only difference was rather than vs instead of...while if one sees OG-12 explanation it has clearly mentioned there must be some other clue in addition to instead of vs rather than as these two have got significant linguistic overlap as to be inseparable....on their own...how a leading testprep company be in such a gross violation with the generator of gmat...

in fact some of the probability/set(Venn diagram) questions are so frustrating and out of scope that the moment I see them I abu** the creators of those questions for full two minutes select an option and move ahead,, after all I m paying $$ and deserve good material....

I also agree Prienston has no representation here, their math is not good but their verbal is superup...In my opinion 110 times better than the MGMAT....I have taken their tests the last time...and posted some of their critical reasoning/sentence correction questions and they were very very appreciated here in this forum...I think creators of this forum must consider giving prienston a space here as well...

I don't really know what to say in regards to MGMAT. I myself have only taken one test, so I can't generalize or anything. As I've said, they are highly regarded on this forum. However, not everyone has to share that opinion. It's perfectly OK to present another point of view.

All I'm saying is that it's better to avoid really strong words or cussing. It sort of undermines the writer's position, in that he or she might come off as simply too upset by the results to be able to make a valid point. As long as you use a civilized way of conveying our opinions, please feel free to present whatever thoughts you have!

I have normally sworn by the MGMAT series, in fact i've recommended it to whoever's asked me about it. I must be their biggest fan!!

Sure the Q is tougher than regular, but I quite liked that about it. The scoring algo is far more accurate than Kaplan or Princeton. I was aiming for a 700+ score and didnt think either Kaplan or Princeton would be able to help me out when it came to that.

As for the original poster's statement "you can never see so many Qs..." of course you can!! The moment you hit the 49-50 score level, you are going to get a string of tougher Qs. Tougher than anything you've ever seen. The GMAC is not stupid. It's no wonder that less that 50people score a perfect 800 every year. Nearly 200,000+ people take the test so that is an unbelieveable ratio.

If it comes to ambiguity of answers, then its a different story. But if you are cribbing about the difficulty level, then perhaps you should consider some other tests. In the close to 3years of moderating MBA forums, this is the first instance i've seen of somebody criticizing the MGMAT tests.

This is a shocker buddy!! and totally contradictory to what I feel about MGMAT. Below is something I wrote on my blog few days back about MGMAT

Manhattan Practice Tests:
Math is really good.. quite time consuming... for every problem you need to think or scratch something on paper.. considering I am an engineer and was always proficient in maths.. I would say this one is really good and fun to solve.. you are always on the edge and its a race against time.. or may be I have become rusted..
Similarly verbal is really good too.. On the whole my verdict for manhattan gmat is that these are really tough tests and if you are scoring above 700 in these tests, I am sure you would score 750+ in GMAT.

I can understand where OP is coming from, but I think the OP is just frustrated because the questions are really really tough.

For MGMAT Math, the math is harder. I don't even want to say a little harder because I think its a lot harder. If you can score 44+ on MGMAT than you're probably 48+ on real thing.

It's designed to be harder than the real thing so when you see the real thing, you think its a cake walk.

THis strategy albeit is a little demoralizing for people that are scoring a little lower.

I would argue that Kaplan math is a little more realistic in terms of difficulty but I think MGMAT goes on record and says that their questions are harder than the real thing so its no secret.

As for Verbal - I think MGMAT / Kaplan are pretty much par for par but in my opinion, Kaplan is a little easier. I've scored 42V on Kaplan before and it wasn't too bad. MGMAT ... is tougher.

MGMAT wants to prepare people for the tougher questions. MGMAT 600-700 questions are probably closer to 700-720 questions when compared to GMAT prep and its 700-800 questions are closer to 740-800 questions vs. GMAT prep.

So I don't think that MGMAT is being deceptive at all. They're pretty clear - everyone agrees that MGMAT is tougher - because you train for tougher so when you're approached with easy - you're golden.

This is a different philosophy with Kaplan who I think just wants you to be familiar with the same level.

This is the first am seeing such a harsh criticism about MGMAT. Have heard that it is tougher than real GMAT. If it tougher then i feel it is really worth practising them, the more harder questions you practise the more easier will be the real GMAT. I prefer working LSAT CR and RC because they are more harder than GMAT. May be the concepts are far more advanced than real GMAT. But certainly this would give an edge over others in GMAT. I heard LSAT guys say they finish the verbal section of GMAT well ahead of time, and they also say GMAT CR and RC are joke for them when compared with LSAT's.

The analogy is if we practise 1000 level questions ( there is no such level, just for instance) then 800 level questions will be a joke, you can crack the real GMAT easier. I believe in this strategy, the more harder questions you practise the more easier will be the real GMAT. Regarding explanations for answers, even OG doesnt give clear explanations to many problems, then that is why we have this forum to discuss such problems. But i do support that it is their concerned test prep companies responsibility to give a clear explanation.

Everyone has different views and different approach, this is mine. Hope this will be addressed by MGMAT staff, Stacey Koprince from MGMAT can help us. Stacey waiting for your reply. Thanks in advance.

I'm using MGMAT and the Quant is absolutely golden! I am actually learning a lot of Math and having fun doing it. Now the tests are a b+^ch but no pain, no gain right...

As for the SC... "There can only be one!" MGMAT!