So here I am, finally posting my personal experience. It's been a long long journey for those of you who know me on this club. I've been at this since like what, 2003? So last month, I finally paid 250USD and forced myself to make the trip down and do the test proper. I'll post my preparation later, as I figure that takes a fair bit of time. Anyway, the day before test day (that was yesterday), I took leave from work. Woke up at 1pm (gosh! that felt good), had a heavy lunch, watched some TV and started work at 3pm. Went through my verbal and quant notes quickly, then settled down to do a ETS paper test at about 4pm. (Why paper test? That's because I ran out of CAT. And besides, the paper tests seems to be pretty easy, a little confident boost wouldn't do me harm a day before the actual test). In the evening, went for dinner with my wife, bummed around after that watching tv, and then settled down to do some reading for the AWA. I suck at essays, so I thought I'd best do some preparation for that too. I went to sleep at 2a.m. (not because of anxiety) and woke up at 10a.m. today. That's a good 8 hours of sleep. Anything less or more and I would probably feel lethargic throughout the day. Anyway, felt pretty good since I had a wee bit of a headache when I went to sleep the night before. Skipped breakfast since it was already 10a.m., so I just took a cup of coffee and bummed around reading the newspaper, listened to a bit of bee gees that was playing on the radio... (It was playing 'how to mend a broken heart' and I was thinking, gee, is that a sign of things to come later today??). I headed out for lunch at 11:20a.m. Standard chinese fare - vegetables, rice, meat and soup). Washed that down with two big mugs of water and left for the test centre. Halfway there, my stomach started acting up. I was thinking 'crap, of all time, this must be my unlucky day'. So I headed for the restroom once I got to the train station. Finished whatever I needed to finish and got the hell out of there so I wouldn't be late. I then started telling myself at least I didn't need the restroom halfway through the test, so it probably wasn't that bad. When I got out of the train station, I got a shock.... where the hell is the test center?! It's just building after buildings with no names... okay, calm down, ah... there's a security guard across the road. I'll pop over and ask him. Okay, he wasn't very friendly, but at least he pointed me in the right direction. When I got into the test center, there was another lady who was going to take the GMAT too. The Pearson staff were very friendly. So after the formality of taking a photo, taking my finger-print (the software looks cool, I asked her where to get it but she didn't know), I was asked to leave my belonging in the lockers. I went looking for locker #8 (8 is supposed to be an auspicious number). Darn, it was taken, most probably some bloke needed luck much more than I did took it. Okay, so much for superstition, just dumped it in locker #3 and move on to the actual test. Before we started, the proctor advised us some renovation works was going building so if we are affected by it, we could use the noise-cancelling head-phones on the desk (cool piece of equipment, but I didn't use it because the noise wasn't that bad, and I didn't think I would feel comfortable with a headphone on my head while I worked). Breezed through the two essays (Thank god! I think I got away with an argument essay with plenty of loopholes to talk about. Issue essay wasn't as good, but not that bad either). Finished both essays in 20 minutes, then took a deep breath and opted to go on to Quant instead of taking a break. I got an easy first question, but it took my 2 minutes to work. Excitement played a part in the 2 minutes, and after I calmed myself down, it was alright from there. About 27 questions into the test, it suddenly occured to me it is the first time I am clicking "D" for the DS questions. I freaked out... holy cow, have I been clicking on "B" instead of "D" after deciding that both statements were sufficient. Darn... I flipped back to the old boards and had a peek, looked fine. Anyway, nothing I could do, just make sure I got the rest right... Finished the Quant with 18 minutes to spare. Decided I wasn't going to click next right away, so I sat around there resting for 2 minutes, then hit next and went for the 10 minutes break. Went to the restroom to wash up. I noticed my hands were blue even though the ink didn't really smudge when I wrote... Then, I amused myself by thinking how it got blue when the ink was black... anyway.... I was back for the verbal within 2 minutes. Verbal was a breeze. Probably not a good sign... I was supposed to get harder questions as the test progressed... easy ones probably meant I had bombed... still, it was pretty good. The RC passages were surprisingly short and easy to understand, CR was the same though there were a few that needed a bit of thinking, and SC was the most straight-forward I've ever seen (none of those 3-4 lines SC questions). Finished this section with 20 minutes to spare again... okay, hit next and hope for the best. It flashed 700, Q48, V38. Hmm... I ought to be happy since my target score was 650-670, but I felt a little disappointed it was at least 730. But with my kind of preparation (more on that later today), 700 is probably way beyond expectations. So my verdict? 1) Was the test center good - Yes. Not a lot of space for writing, but I practised with much less space, so that's okay 2) Was the boards and marker crappy - No, they were surprising of good quality. A little smooth for writing, but you'll quickly get used to it after one-two quant problems. 3) Quant - I didn't get any question on probability, no question on work. Instead, I was literally carpet-bombed with problems involving number properties. If you could solve most of the DS on GMATClub forum, I assure you will be good for quant. 4) Verbal - Not too difficult, though my score could be higher. But heck, with my kind of preparation, V38 isn't too bad. 5) Am I going to take it again? - Unless my test score expires in 5 years time and I need the score to do something else... otherwise, NO way!! So now I'm going to take a bath, eat some dinner and bum through the night... yahoooo!!! GMATBlackbelt, I know you're taking the test later today. Good luck!!

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Finally in the 700 club - (Q48, 85%), (V38, 84%), (700, 92%)

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done_gre_now_gmat

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30 Sep 2007, 12:17

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Congratulations!

Your math posts are extremely helpful for someone like me who has just started to get into this.

Thanks for sharing your experience in great detail!

ywilfred

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30 Sep 2007, 22:19

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Thank you everyone for your kind words!

Killer Squirrel, nervousgmat, I'll still be hanging around here for a long while..

GMATBlackbelt, all the best for Monday. I'm sure you'll do fine. I'll be applying for the Masters of Accounting with the Singapore Management University. The brand name isn't as strong as the big business schools such as Wharton or Chicago etc, but the faculty are all from the big 4 accounting firms, so it speaks a lot for the program =)

subhen

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01 Oct 2007, 02:21

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ywilfred
Hearty Congratulations. You deserve it !!! Well done. :woohoo

Fig

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01 Oct 2007, 07:41

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Huge congrats !!!

U have been a so much active member here :D

..... It's very nice to see that you are fine with a score that pleases u, even if I think that a 50+ in Q is in a better adequation to u

Best of luck for your next steps ! :D

asaf

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01 Oct 2007, 07:52

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It is pretty evident from your posts that if you really wanted you could score much higher than what you have now!

but you ask me 700 (plus) is awesome!

Congratulations!

ywilfred

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07 Oct 2007, 00:23

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update: Got a crappy 4.5 for my AWA. That's just 3% above the median score.

kidderek

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07 Oct 2007, 01:02

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Great job.

Praetorian

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07 Oct 2007, 01:04

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ywilfred

Sorry for the late post. Congratulations!

You have set an excellent example with your contributions that will benefit many for years to come.

best wishes

Ravshonbek

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07 Oct 2007, 01:45

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Praetorian

ywilfred

Sorry for the late post. Congratulations!

You have set an excellent example with your contributions that will benefit many for years to come.

best wishes

Wow.
from Praetorian, that's loveley!
You deserve it Ywiflred!

uphillclimb

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07 Oct 2007, 06:07

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I am late in posting my congratulations...Well Done! So many of your explanations have been helpful to me in my own quest. You've built up a lifetime of good karma by posting on this site - I know that you will land in the MBA program of your choice, and that great things will continue to happen for you.

Congratulations once again, and all the best to you!

ioiio

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07 Oct 2007, 22:30

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I received my score too. But my authentication code is in the office... Few more hours of wait

ywilfred

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07 Oct 2007, 22:48

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haha....good luck! I'm sure you won't do worse than my 4.5 in AWA, because I wrote crap and still got away =)

Current Student

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07 Oct 2007, 23:03

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I wish someday..i can boast a similar feat as you..but until then..good luck on the essays

Paul

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08 Oct 2007, 14:11

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I didn't browse this forum for months and I'm so glad to see that you achieved your target ywilfred! We indeed started at about the same time and I am so happy to hear about an old timer coming up with another success story. Now, round2 will start. I'm anxious to know which schools you will pick.

ioiio

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08 Oct 2007, 18:14

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ywilfred

haha....good luck! I'm sure you won't do worse than my 4.5 in AWA, because I wrote crap and still got away =)

Looks like we wrote the same crap. It sucks. I also got 4.5

vikramjit_01

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12 Oct 2007, 13:13

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Congratulations ywilfred!!
Inspite of your incredible number of posts and your very significant contributions to the club you still seem to maintain a low profile. What would you call that?... Modesty?... Humility?... I think both in your case.
Like many here, I have a lot to thank you for. Your SC notes and Beginners Re-worked Questions thread were crucial in my preparation for the GMAT.

I think 700 has a double meaning for you.
The first thats it's your score and
the second that its the number of people whose GMAT scores wouldn't have been what they are with your help (myself included).
Now maybe I am wrong with the second. Your excellent work might have helped even more than 700!

The best to you.

vinviper

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04 Mar 2008, 14:46

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congrats!!

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Finally in the 700 club - (Q48, 85%), (V38, 84%), (700, 92%)

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