bb,
PROS:1) GMAT Club is by far the best source for the quant preparation. Moderators (Bunuel, shrouded, Karishma) are just wonderful. I cannot praise their attitude, willingness to help, and the timely fashion in which they respond to your questions. Thank you all very much.
2)
GMAT Club tests are extremely helpful. The good thing is that if you are an active member, you don't have to pay for them.
3) Personal experience thread is very useful.
4) Topic tags were very useful as well.
5) 100,000 members competition was great.
6) Book reviews, test reviews, suggestions etc. are all very useful.
7) Very helpful regular forum members. Again, I would say that GMAT Club's members are the most helpful out of all the GMAT forums.
8) The forum is very functional. Although I have a few reservation about the forum's design (see below), I believe the forum is much more functional than those of the competition (e.g., tags, search function, forum's hierarchical structure, math symbols).
CONS:1) The forum's look and feel is kind of "unprofessional". By that I mean the following:
- it is cluttered with too much elements (e.g., almost one third of the screen is used by the GMAT Club's icon + panel + the rotating list of upcoming events), which you don't need to see all the time
- the overall design is kind of old.
2) The verbal section was not as useful as the quant section. Actually, many replies (unfortunately even from verbal forum moderators) were not helpful at all. BeatTheGmat and
Manhattan GMAT sites are, IMO, much stronger in that department. In fact, I stopped using that section here all together.
3) Not too many real experts in the verbal section of the forum.
To sum it up:- GMAT Club is by far the best source for quant preparation (moderators+++,
gmatclub tests +++, math bible +++). And by that I mean it's like comparing the ocean to some lake.
- It is very functional (tags, structure, search)
- Members are very helpful
- Its verbal section is not quite useful and, IMO, is considerably behind the competition
- Its design is a little bit outdated and "unprofessional"
Suggested improvements:- Try to invite some experts to the verbal section (Ron, Mitch and others). Although that probably might be somewhat difficult. I don't know.
- New design: less clutter
Overall, GMAT Club is a terrific place. I have included some negatives not because I think that they are substantial, but because bb asked for an honest feedback.