Cracking the GRE with DVD, 2009 Edition (Graduate School Test Preparation)

DISCLAIMER: I am NOT violating my commitment to privacy to ETS. Read carefully: the following information makes NO mention of specific GRE questions, nor of categories of questions, nor of ANYTHING related to specific test content. Rather, it compares what I believe to be the test's difficulty to this particular book. So, ETS, don't whine: you're not being cheated.

This book provides excellent preparation for the GRE General Test as a whole. It is particularly strong on the verbal and analytical sections. However, its coverage of quantitative contents (math/algebra/geometry) is greatly underdeveloped and seriously troublesome.

The strengths of "The Princeton Review's Cracking the GRE" lie primarily with its techniques to, well, CRACK the GRE. It suggests very many tips that apply to test-taking in general and to the GRE in particular. For example, can you eliminate up to three possible answers (out of five) just with ballparking, or with a little bit of...Read more

From the good reviews here, I decided to buy this book with DVD. However, it's really not worth the money or the time.
1. the book is too short to have enough useful information
2. the online practice questions have almost no relation to the actual test....also, the online practice questions are doggy, once I did a CAT, the quantitative questions did not have any geometry questions in there, I got only 700, yet only got 1 question wrong (in the ETS CD, I got the 2nd question wrong and was able to get 800)
On the other hand, it does contain some useful hints, but they are better covered in the Kaplan book.
Yes, I've done the GRE, got >1400, no help from this book though.

I suggest for people who want to do well in the GRE to buy Barrons (very good for math) and Kaplan (good for verbal). More importantly, practice the free material that ETS sends you!

I received a 750Q, 600V on the GRE, and I wouldn't have been able to do it without this book. It is an excellent resource for making the GRE palatable and conquerable. It is organized efficiently, and it offers unique and helpful strategies. There are, however, some caveats:

1. I found that it makes the math seem easier than it often is on the real test. While this is good for low-scorers, I wouldn't have gotten my 750 if I had only used this resource.

2. The online practice tests are much harder than the real test. Take your practice scores with a grain of salt. I barely broke 620Q on several of the practice tests.

3. While it is excellent, it works best in concert with other prep guides such as the official ETS book (though beware of this book's deceptively easy math sections, which have barely any hard problems) and Powerprep software and Kaplan's DVD guide. My roommate and I found Barron's book to be terrible: It made the math more complex...Read more