I took the test at the 44th st center in Manhattan today and scored a 710.I am somewhat relieved but I felt I could have gotten a better quant score since I scored 49 consistently in my practice tests.
Warning:Please do not take more than 3 to 4 min of your break time. You must be wondering why I am saying this.
The proctor told me that I had 10 minutes between sections. I was under the impression that the break duration is 5 minutes because this is what I noticed in gmatprep. So after my quant I took a break to eat a granola bar,drink some water and use the restroom. When I got back I noticed an alert that mentioned that I had I lost 30 seconds because i supposedly took a longer break !
For the life of me I cant understand how this happened.
Proper debrief:The 44th street center staff are quite professional. Nice flat screens with enough writing space beside the monitors.
Essays -
Argument essay was quite easy. But the issue essay was vague. I just managed to finish typing something in 30 min.
Quant -
I started off well and hit some tough DS's at the 5th question and about the 15th. I maintained some momentum until about 26th at which point i think i solved 2 questions in a row incorrectly. I came across no DS's until 31 when I hit 3 more. And then no more DS's. Only some PS questions.
In my gmatprep's whenever I hit 49 I came across a large number of DS questions towards the end ( usually about 6 between 30 and 37 ). Since this did not happen, I realised I had screwed up a bit in quant.
Verbal -
Even with losing 30 seconds , I started off well. I took more time than usual in RC's and jotted down some points while reading.
I came across an SC from gmatprep too. I got the distinct impression that I hit more SC questions than CR questions in the test. I got hit by 4 RC's totally and the 4th one was when I was on question 33 with barely 6 minutes to go. Because I had spent a little too much time on RC, I was left with no time for the last 3 questions- 2 CR and one SC. Took wild guesses here.
PreparationI had been preparing on and off for 6months now. But I started serious preparation only in the last 3 months.
I used all the usual books and software -
OG 11, gmatprep, gmatter,
MGMAT CAT.
Of course , the gmatclub forums have been extremely useful. I believe that consistently solving verbal questions on this forum has contributed to my 40 on the verbal section.
Many smart and resourceful people participate in these forums - saravalli, bsd_lover,so
Ndenso,fresinha,jallenmorris to name a few - whose comments , suggestions and questions were very useful.
Thank you all !
I am wondering though if 710 can hold its own in what will be a high volume application year ( 2009).