Hey was just wondering why is it that after NPD reported that PS3 outsold 360 by 39k in jan and 26k in feb VGC still has 360 outselling PS3 in Jan by 62k and 17k for feb ...

   That means NPD has PS3 for 08 - 65k above 360 yet VGC claims 360 outsold PS3 by 79k ... which results in a reasonable difference of 144k ...  

    Is ioi waiting for more data or does he simply beleive NPD has got it wrong ? I understand NPD data is just for the US but if we look at Canada/Mexico as being NPD*1.1 then it still leaves PS3 ahead of 360 for Jan + Feb ( and we have all seen the liks to Microsoft admiting that they were outsold) ...

  As a result of this i was wondering if the data could be corrected. Swapping PS3's and 360's sales data for NA (on VGC) would imo correct the discrepancies between NPD and VGC data (it would reduce the difference from 144k to 14k which is well within the margin of error)...  

IT is not VGC's aim to mirror NPD. Whilst accurate numbers should be within a decent range of NPD's numbers, NPD has been proven incorrect often enough, and VGC aims to offer an ALTERNATE measure of hardware sales.

ON hardware sales VGC is very accurate, especially in the USA. In the holidays last year VGC was more accurate than NPD according to shipment figures released by the big three. On software, VGC still has a lot of work to do.

now, I'm not expecting VGC to have exact number, in fact, I expect nobody to do that.

What I WAS hoping is that VGC can predict some kind of trend, some kind of consumer shift (or lack there of) in term of their console purchasing.

and yes, I used "was". It's unfair to be critical of ioi and I am not going to do that.

Instead, I just won't talk about sales figure (console or games) much anymore. I'm gong to stick purely on games and off topic threads.

Make no mistake i don't expect VGC to have exact numbers.

Nor do i mind if ioi chooses not to update the data due various reason ( eg. he wants more data, thinks his data is more accurate (which is possible), decides to take a few weeks off, etc)

Im just curious as WHY vgc data confilcts with npd data on which console is selling more...

>Im just curious as WHY vgc data confilcts with npd data on which console is selling more...
Why? Because VGC uses the same method as NPD, taking a sample method and predicting the whole trend.

Such method works best if you have as many samples as you can. and NPD has WAY MORE resources than VGC has...

Wait ioi still has 360 outselling the PS3 in January?

Hey ioi -- i understand the difficulty of coming up with the data for VGC ( and i wouldn't be here if i didn't trust it ). I was just basically curious as to why VGC has 360 outselling PS3 in NA while NPD has the opposite.

I just assumed that with Microsoft's recent claims of shortages and NPD data that VGC would have atleast 1 of the months with PS3 ahead of 360 ... but as you say it is possible to come to different answers due the lack of data avaliable ( damn Wal-mart and other retailers whom don't give out there sales figures)

ohh and thanks for the reply ioi

This is really getting annoying Kingofwale, really - some kind of trend? The difference in NPD data was 69k for two months, which trend could you predict out of this despite the obvious thing that both consoles sell about the same? Beeing a fan of a certain console is one thing but VGchartz is here to estimate the numbers and not to make supporter of console A happy....

The differences are fairly enormous when it comes to software. NPD has DMC4 at about 500,000 units combined whereas VGchartz as it at 1,000,000 for February.

Numbers seem generally much higher on VGChartz. I suppose that makes it more exciting, heh.

 When VGC consistently under track / over tracks the same consoles, it seems your sample weighting needs to be adjusted.

 But ioi, with such a small sample (1%), don't you think VGChartz should use any source available to improve your numbers? The problem I see is that you guys estimate every week (awesome job btw) but you also keep historical data and total sales. This historical/total data could benefit from NPD adjustment, just like you do for others with ChartTrak data...