How are the test exams on 800score.com

Thanks ikaytas.... That replay was a good perspective on the 800 score tests. However I have some other questions for you , since you have taken the real GMAT test... How was the quant on your real ? Was it real tough or was it alright for you ? Do you think the first 15 questions matter in GMAT ? I hear Yes and I hear NO... That's parallel construction I guess ... Anyways , how tough was verbal ???
How did you study for QUANT and Verbal ?

I know thats lotta questions but it will give me a good perspective.
THanks for your help..

The quant in the real exam is much much tougher than OG problems. What mistake i made was that i had kept gmat prep for the last couple of days before the exam and when i started working on that, i found that the standards are totally different..but didn't want to cancel the date so took the test. faired well in maths though...50 was a good score. but yes...the standrads are not og or gmat prep or princeton. standrads are manhattan gmat, gmat prep ...for sure. my paper started with a super hard inequality which took me 5 mins to solve on the real test.

for quant i would suggest the following things:
1. gmat club : all 25 challenges...they are just toooooooooooooooo good!
2. manhattan gmat : take the 3 full tests. the math section is very very good.
3. 800 score com -> maths is quite hard
4. gmat prep...maths is just what u get on the test
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for verbal, since i got 33 i am not a position to tell u anything. but u know. i didn't leave any gaps in prep. and the paper seemed so smooth in the real test. the verabl standard is same as og. infact during the test, i was surprised that maths was seeming so tough and verbal is seeming so easy...but at the ned of the test, the scores crushed me down. 690 is a competitive score but is not balanced at all for me. its totally biased towads quant. for the verbal, i feel that i got the first 3/4 questions all wrong. then the paper became smooth and i couldn't get a better edge.

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regarding the first 15/20 myth, i would say that with the current gmat, u will get penalized less even if ur number of mistakes are more. it counts on the difficulty level. u can get 3 out of first 10 wrong and even then u can get 40+ in verbal ( i have got it in gmat prep). but first few questions, mistakes in a chain will finish u brutally.....also, i have seen for both maths and english, very tough questions are apperaing at the end too....
and even getting an easy one wrong at the beginning, if i could crack these, i could get 51. so each question is important and u can get kind of 50/40 combo with 5 mistakes in maths and 8-10 mistakes in verbal. but, first few questions, mistakes in a chain....a death nail! Thats what happened with me when i took the test, for the verbal section....one thing is for sure, if the paper seems very smooth then u r on the wrong track...

I believe it is quite good.
The math portion is quite tough (probably tougher than the real GMAT math tests).
The verbal portion is probably best representative of real GMAT tests.
The only thing I was not satisfied with was the explanations that they offered.

I'm definately a verbal person. But still I'm very familiar with the GMAT and GMAT quant. I took the first 800score last night (the one identified as the sample one). I found the verbal easy... scored 47. I felt the verbal felt pretty simmilar to the GMAT. I did not find that the quant felt like the GMAT at all. The questions seemed quite a bit harder. I scored a 41... which isn't terribly out of line with my scores, but again it didn't have the "GMAT math" feel. What I did like though was the timer that told you not only time left but what question you should be on. I have trouble with quant timing, so that was kind cool.

Hi guys, I need some help interpreting the scores from 800Score Quant part. Infortunately I belong to the group of people, who makes a GMATprep test in the last prep phase (I know, it's a big mistake, but it's just a reality), that's why I can not compare GMATprep to 800score.

I'm not interested in the scoring methodology and validness. Just one question: Are real GMAT questions much tougher then those of 800Score Quant or can one say the ones of 800Score are at least somehow representative ??
Or am I just lost in the 700-800 Level Question collections and became a kind of zombie...))
I've read some comments here, and many say it's even tougher then real GMAT....

Today I've finished 3 Quant tests (extended Time mode, but actually I've finished all of them a few minutes earlier):
1st - Section Score 51 (36 of 37 correct), 99 percentile
2nd - Section Score 50 (33 of 37 correct), 94 percentile
3rd - Section Score 50 (34 of 37 correct), 94 percentile

Hi BrainLab,

I'm hoping that you clarify a couple of points from your post:

1) It sounds like you're getting close to your Official Test Date. When are you taking the Official GMAT?
2) Have you actually taken any of the Official GMAC CATs? If so, then how did you score (including the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores)?
3) What is your score goal?

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Hi Rich, sure, I'm glad to give you some further information. To be honest I've been preparing for GMAT toooo long, with interruptions etc.
1) I've not yet registered the date for the exam, but it will take place in this year for sure
2) I plan to take GMAC Cats next week. (big mistake to make them so close to the real exam, I know)
3) It's trivial, but I need a magic number 700+

Till now I've done lots of 700-800 Level questions collections, OG + VR + QR each question x3 times with error logs etc. But my biggest problem is - actually while reviewing any particular topic I can solve almost any question, but after some time I'm just not able to solve really tough questions in a mixed Q's collection - I forget the material, tricks and formulas..
I try to use only official questions or at least MGMAT... I find in the verbal part, most of other sources are just off topic.

I just wanted to try my self in the quant part and took 3 quant CATs from 800 Score, and they seemed easy. And my quesion was, whether the question difficulty is somehow representative for the real GMAT Test

Hi BrainLab,

If you're planning to take the GMAT this year (meaning sometime in the next 3 weeks), and your score goal is 700+, it's difficult to properly assess whether you're actually at that ability level or not. Since those CATs are the most realistic way to assess yourself, until you take a FULL-LENGTH GMAC CAT (with the Essay and IR sections - and under realistic and test-like conditions), we don't really know how strong your abilities actually are. It certainly looks like you have the necessary knowledge and overall skills, but there's a reality to Test Day that I'm not sure if you've actually prepared for.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Hi Rich,
thanks for the quick response. I plan to take a full CAT everyday till 17.12 (starting tomorrow). I think the biggest issue will be my timing, as I've never done a full CAT till now.
I'll be also able to retake the exam in January and will have 3 weeks for preparation, nevertheless I'll try my luck this year.

Kind regards,
Mike

Hi Mike,

Taking a CAT every day is NOT a good idea - you'll likely end up scoring at the same approximate level, wasting a bunch of CATs in the process and experiencing 'burn out.' Focus on taking just that first FULL-LENGTH CAT, then report back here with your scores. With that data, we can talk through what you should focus on next.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Hi Rich,

thanks, your help is very valuable for me. I've just finished my first CAT and as expected timing was my biggest problem (But I've answered all the questions).
The overall score is 670: Quant 47 (18 Incorrect), Verbal 35 (11 Incorrect) --> to be honest it was very surprising to me to see this score by such a miserable performance, as I just skipped almost all RC questions (made a guess), and skipped all quant questions, in which I could immediately identify that I won't solve them even if spent 10 more minutes. In verbal I concentrated on CR and SC, and in Quant I just concentrated on questions that I can solve.

Next step - I'll review all the questions now to assess my weakneses. BTW the quant part in 800Score was just a piece of cake compared to the real GMAT CAT.

Hi Mike,

Assuming that you took this CAT in a realistic and test-like fashion, this 670 is a solid performance. From the Quant and Verbal Scaled Scores, you have the opportunity to pick up points in BOTH sections of the Test.

As you review this CAT, you should take a good look at WHY you were getting questions wrong. Yes, some of them sound as though you were taking 'fast guesses', but there are likely questions that you COULD have gotten correct, but didn't. Were those incorrect answers due to silly/little mistakes? If so, then that's an issue that you have to work on to improve your scores.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Hi Rich,

yes, you're absolutely right regarding "fast gueses". Here is a breakdown of mistakes the quant part:
While reviewing the material, I could easily solve 11 of 18 questions (within time limits) which I've marked incorrectly before.
- 3 errors Probability/Combinatorics: Lack of conceptual knowledge
- 4 errors: little mistakes either in the calculation or in the approach
- 11 errors: actually I could solve all of this questions within a time limit. I've made those mistakes because of: anxiety, timing, silly mistakes, fast guesses and most of them because I've not applied what I had learned before, means either because of the time preassure, or just beacuse of a silly anxiety.

But to be honest what really puzzled me was the great number of 700 Level questions + 3 or 4 probability/combinatorics questions. I thought that there would be less of such kind and more easier questions so that one can save some time. But in reality, one must just skip the questions that one can not solve for sure even with 3-4 Minutes+ in order to invest that time in 700 questions that one can probably solve. TOUGH.

I'll Update this post, as soon as I've reviewed the verbal part.

Verbal Part
Answered almost all of the SC and RC questions correctly. Bombed RC completely, means had strings of wrong answers 3-4 on each text (was expected, as I've just clicked through to get more time on SC and CR)

Hi Mike,

At this point, you shouldn't be focused on the 'implied level' of the question - instead, you should be focused on your precision. Based on what you've described, you could have easily score Q51 on this CAT, but you made too many little mistakes. You would likely have scored 700+ from that increase alone and with a bit of extra emphasis on RC, you could conceivably be scoring 750+.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

Hi Rich,
I've just looked up the available exam dates and there is only one available slot tomorrow in my town, and one more on December, 29th but 400 km away from here. The next available slot in my town is on January, 18th - it's too much time I think. But taking the exam tomorrow is just too risky, taking into consideration that I've taken only one CAT till now. I just don't want to take 2 or 3 real exams, but rather give GMAT just one shot. I've bought MGMAT 6 CATs, after 6 MGMAT CATs and 2 more GMATPrep CATs it must be sufficient I think...

Hi Mike,

I agree that taking the GMAT tomorrow would likely NOT be a good idea (there's no harm in doing so, but it does not appear that you're at your 'peak' yet). The 400km travel for the Test on December 29th also strikes me as problematic. The 29th is only 12 study-days away (which still isn't much time) and that type of travel usually NEGATIVELY impacts Test Takers' performances. Given the three options, I'd say the Test on January 18th is probably your best overall option.

GMAT assassins aren't born, they're made,
Rich

I've just written MGMAT CAT, it's more realistic, but the quant part is harder it terms of calculation time required.
Some questions were just too time consuming but it's a good practice, since MGMAT questions require more intensive knowledge of formulas.
Quant 41 (- 6 points when compared to the GMAT PREP 47) I could solve most of them but just didn't have enough time and had to guess especially towards the last 7-8 questions.
Verbal 35 (same as GMAT PREP)

Hmm... This result is not encouraging at all. But I've heard that MGMAT Quant part is harder.