Need your advice on retake of GMAT

[phoenix.rkchr]

Dear Manhattan Faculty,

Yesterday, I appeared for official GMAT test and unfortunately I could score only 660 (49Q, 31V). I am not happy with the score and I know this is not a good score to target top 30 USA business schools. I am from India and have 6.5 years of IT industry exp.

I need your advice on retake of the test.
How should I prepare for retake? I have already gone through all Manhattan books (all quant and SC books- except CR book)?
How many practice test should I give? As I have already used Manhattan CATs, GMATPrep CATs, all major online free tests (Kaplan, knewton etc..)?
Will it be useful to repeat the MGMAT and GMATPrep CATs?

I want to apply in first round and the deadlines of most of the USA schools is in first week of Oct 2010. Keeping this in mind I should give the retake within a month so that I have some time to work upon the application. Please give your suggestion on this too.

In MGMAT and GMATPrep practce CATs, I got average of 690 (range: from 660 to 730).

At the moment I am totaly confused about what should I need to do. I request you to direct me in the right direction. I will highly obliged to you.

Thanks
Shailendra

[phoenix.rkchr]

Dear Manhattan Faculty,

I am looking forward to hear from you. Could you please advice me?

Thanks

[StaceyKoprince]

Please do not reply to your own post unless you have new information to add. We answer questions in order, oldest first, and the date is based upon the date of your LAST reply - so you move yourself later in the queue when you reply to your own post.

Please see my reply to your other post, here:

mgmat-vs-gmatprep-vs-actual-gmat-t6506-15.html

In that reply, I ask you to do some analysis of a recent MGMAT practice test and let us know the results. Please also let us know whether you took the practice test under full official conditions, including essays and length of breaks. If not, let us know how you deviated from official testing conditions.

Also, absolutely do not start taking a bunch of additional practice tests. It sounds like you may have been focused on the quantity of your study - if you do more, that will make you better. That's not really how improvement works on this test, especially at the higher scoring levels.

CAT exams are really good for (a) figuring out where you're scoring right now, (b) practicing stamina, and (c) analyzing your strengths and weaknesses. The actual act of just taking the exam is NOT so useful for improving. It's what you do with the test results / between tests that helps you to improve.

We can talk about how to study after you do the analysis of your recent practice test and share the results with us.