Hi Saurabh, I too think this wording is ambiguous. Looking through the Official Guides, it seems that the GMAT writers use phrases such as "A is 5 times B" to indicate ratios: A = 5B. Alternatively, they use phrases such as "A is B greater than C" to indicate the difference betwe...

Hi Raj, Both are grammatically correct because they are parallel, but "costs associated with X and Y" is preferable to "costs associated with X and with Y" because it is shorter. In general, the benefits of parallel construction in sentences are better concision and clarity . For...

Hi Saurabh, In order to select a team of 4 such that no married couple is on the team together, we would have to pick one spouse from each of the 4 couples. Of course, from each couple, we could chose either spouse to serve on the team. So there are two possible choices from four couples, or 2^4 = 1...

Hi Mariela, An alternative to solving for the rate (or to solving for the total time, as in the O.G. solution) would be to set up a comparison. Since the pool is filled at a constant rate, the rate of filling the first 3/5 of the pool is the same as the rate of filling the last 2/5 of the pool. Rate...

Can you clarify Statement (2)?

Is it: n^(x - n) < 0

or is it: (n^x) - n < 0

For solvability, I am guessing it is the latter, but just want to confirm...

Hi Saurabh, Overall, nice job. On the positive side: 1. Clear organization, easy to follow due to use of signal words such as "primarily," "secondly," etc. 2. Your points are well-supported by examples (e.g. the furniture store contrasted to the cafe in your second point) 3. Well...

You are welcome! One more thing: I recognized this essay topic as one from the Official Guide 11th edition p. 769, but I should have posted the citation myself before responding. A reminder for everyone: Please cite the source of your AWA Essay topics, same as you do for Quant and Verbal questions. ...

Well done, everyone! A good hint that you should look for something to factor out is the tremendously large numbers involved in this problem. There is no way that you would be expected to actually compute 2^34 or 2^28. Thus, the expression must simplify by some more elegant means: factoring out the ...

Quick citation note: This is from the Official Guide for GMAT Quantitative Review. For copyright reasons, we must cite full source name. Hi Carla, You are on exactly the right track. Since n is an integer, n^2 must be a perfect square. Thus, the prime factors of n would show up as pairs of those sam...

Quick citation note: This is from the Official Guide for GMAT Quantitative Review. For copyright reasons, we must cite full source name.

Good explanation, GMAT 5/18, thanks for the assist!

Quick citation note: This is from the Official Guide for GMAT Quantitative Review. For copyright reasons, we must cite full source name.

Quick citation note: This is from the Official Guide for GMAT Quantitative Review. For copyright reasons, we must cite full source name.

Quick citation note: This is from the Official Guide for GMAT Review, 11th edition. For copyright reasons, we must cite full source name. Great discussion, I think this will be useful to a lot of people. In case it helps, I generally read "distinct" as "different." So "two d...

Quick citation note: This is from the Official Guide for GMAT Quantitative Review. For copyright reasons, we must cite full source name. Hi Carla, I think Saurabh pretty much covered it (thanks!), but I wanted to chime in about one thing. You asked "can we just do this?" about adding the e...

Yes, you often will get the wrong answer, although not necessarily every time. For example, if you mis-categorize a positive/negative question as a fraction/integer question, and thus use FIZ (fractions, integers, zero) instead of NPZ (negative, positive, zero) as a reminder of the values to check, ...