Xavinoid

MS/PhD is usually much harder to get into than MS-only. If they accept less MS students than PhD, then it may be true that the MS-only is harder. Usually top schools accept many more MS students than PhD.

I think your profile looks very good for a CS PHD because you will be completing a research thesis for your MS. I know plenty of people who go from Math to CS in graduate studies.

If your purpose is to develop electrochemical technologies for the future, then you should probably think about doing a research oriented MS or a PhD. This is why research degrees exist.

Why do you need an MA now if you know you want a PHD? Why not get a PHD now? Why not wait and get a MA+PHD later at the same time and just work now? Maybe I am just thinking of my own field though...

Your application looks good, it would be best to get a LOR from a prof you did research with (like you're trying to do). Make sure you do decent on the GRE (90th % in Q) and you will be fine. Make sure to spend enough time on your statement of purpose/overall application so that all your good attributes aren't for nothing. Only having industry experience would put you in a tough situation, but having three research opportunities (without publications is fine) will counter this. I believe it is a good thing to have the industry experience in addition to research because it presents well-rounded engineering experience. You have an idea of what both academia and industry are like - most people are clueless about one or the other. You are probably just overthinking the industry thing in general - no one in the committee is going to be pulling hairs over the fact that you worked at Intel for 6 months. It looks like you have a good work ethic and I am sure the it will come off this way. SIDE NOTE: I'm not sure why you would not apply to Georgia Tech just because of Atlanta, especially considering you're applying to Cornell (which is notorious for being in a miserably isolated area). Atlanta should be leaps better than some of the other top school locations (Cornell, UIUC, Purdue, etc...). I understand your other choices because MIT, Stanford, Berkeley, UCSD, Caltech are easily the best locations and also recognized as the very best EE schools in the country, but... every single one of the schools you're applying to is extremely competitive. I'm not suggesting to apply to back-up schools (because that really isn't a good idea for a PHD), but I am suggesting you should add 1-2 more top schools to your list, even if their locations are not as ideal. I can't imagine how short your list would be if California didn't exist (well, I guess I can imagine it would be 2). Some additions to consider that have decent locations: Georgia Tech, Michigan (woot), UCLA, UT Austin

I've always thought that although certain EU universities are amazing world-wide, they don't carry as much weight in the US as a US degree. Try asking your friends to name a EU university and you might be surprised because most people have only heard of Oxford/Cambridge. I think that if you want to end up in academia/industry the US, you should do Texas Tech. The only difference I know of is that a PHD in EU is only 3 years (I think?). I am much more familiar with US universities in my field than EU ones. I've met plenty of graduate students and faculty who have come from EU for undergrad, but are going to/have went to a US grad program. I'm not sure I've met anyone with a graduate EU degree.

Visiting the schools is definitely the most important aspect. I would never do early decision. I'm trying not to favor any of the schools I am applying to so that I can choose the final school based on my personal fit and so on.

It is very well known that the best RFIC, MMIC, mixed signal, and analog schools are: UCLA, UCSD, Berkeley Stanford Michigan then: Caltech Georgia Tech U Washington Columbia UT Austin The way I know this is from attending Michigan's program. The way you will know this is by talking to people like me The top 3 (UCLA, UCSD, Berkeley) will be just as hard to get into as the rest honestly, all of these are very competative schools. You can get an idea of relative acceptance rates from that UCSD link posted above (wish I saw this when I applied), I think UCSD might have a lower acceptance rate because of the fact they only accept the students they want to keep for sure (Mich does this, but I'm not so sure about Stanford and the others). It is true that places like Cornell will be hard to get into for circuits, but only because they don't have a large circuit program This is all assuming you plan to apply to RFIC, MMIC, mixed signal, and analog. Edit: Found another professor's page after clicking on the one above that may help give you a good idea of the applications process for top schools: http://web.eng.ucsd.edu/ece/groups/electromagnetics/Admissions.html this is a very good reference for what top schools look for in terms of gpa, gre, application in general. This professor is really well known and his listed gre scores are definitely in your reach. It seems he emphasizes language and writing skills in addition to engineering. I would ignore the top 25 schools thing, this is definitely the least important aspect - if your application is good, its good regardless of your school.