Dear All,

Like many others I have been a silent reader (mostly) on this forum. This forum has helped me a lot in my PMP exam prep. I paid fees for PMP test on 25th Oct 2010 and took the exam exactly after 1 year 24th Oct 2011.

I was busy in CMMi Level-5  assessment for my organization.My preperation was on & off for the first 8 months.There was also a time when i did not study for several weeks.

Ok here are my 2 cents.... a summary of my PMP Preparation:

Books Referred::

~Head First ( I had no plans of writing PMP test, I bumped into this book in a bookstore and picked it because of its Brain friendly nature...still no plans for taking PMP test)

~After reading HF I decied to register with PMI and referred PMBOK (not thoroughly) sometimes.

~Went through Rita 6th Ed. twice.

~I had Andy Crowe went through it just once.

Till August 2011, I had read all PMP topics atleast once. Decided to prepare thoroughly,booked14 Oct 11 for test. I practiced a lot of Questions. Here are my Scores.

~Started with Oliver Laehman (200 Qns.) - 76%

~Rita Fast-Track - 75% -85% (in mostly all tests)

~Head First - 200 Qns - 86%

~Andy Crowe (200 Qns.) - 81%

~Simpli-Learn free 200 Qns (67%)--- **This One is some what close to real Exam, but still Quality of Qns. can be better **

~Exam Central - 80-90% in most Knowledge Areas.

~PM Perfect (Purchased) - 85% - 95% in all Knowledge Areas.

~Tried PM-Study 15 free Qns. the website could not publish results..I was not impressed..did not take 200 Qns. test from them.

Most helpful was Chowdhry's & Rajesh Nair's Notes

Now.......Judgement Day 24th Oct-11.

P.S. Prometric Center Phone was down..I was trying to locate it though I was standing 50 meters away. Fortunately, I reached 1 hour early & was well aware of that area..managed to locate it.

**** Real Exam is Really Different from All the Above Sample Tests*****

~ I could complete 200 Qns. of any sample test in 2.5 hours...Real Exam took me 4 Hours...

~ Question in real Exam are Hand Picked !!!!..to test  your knowledge..

~65% Qns are 4-5 plus liners ...But...Its NOT the Qns. that are Tough....Its the 4 Choices :)

~You nail down 2 answers,...and then Think of a Clue..which will give you the correct answer,That why it took me 4 hrs to complete the test I marked 6-8 Qns. for review

~ I took 2 breaks for restroom..1 break (last one) to eat something..quickly.

~ Numericals--- about 15 and 5 were tough even for a metrics & stats guy...just 3-4 were simple.Inbuilt calculator was slow..FYI

I Suppose few wierd / difficult Qns. were..25 experimental & non-scoring ones. Thankfully..They are not considered.Roughly 25-30 direct Qns.. and a very few direct Qns on ITTO.

Most Qns. were situational & wordy which include what should the PM do FIRST / NEXT etc. scenarios.

It was just 4 minutes left..I pressed "End Test" button and Got the Below Result::

Initiating    :: Proficient

Planning   :: Mod-Proficient

Execution :: Proficient

M&C         :: Proficient

Closing     :: Mod-Proficient

Special Thanks to Chowdhry & Rajesh Nair for providing excellent Notes (whole PMBOK in 9 Pages)

All the Best to those who are planning to write the exam.

Regards

Vipin Gaur (PMP)