HappySquirell - Yes, I only took 3 months before, because any more and it'd always lead into December, or a holiday month, and screw the data up.

January-March is NOT a slow period compared to any other month. On the contrary, January is typically very very busy (see Jan 2007's sales here on VGChartz compared with June), as early in the year, people are still buying massive numbers of products with gift cards in the US given from Christmas, that help out sales.

George - 7 of the 9 cuts increased sales over the next 3 months, not 6/9. One was very marginal (PSP).

Also, if you consider a 60% increase in sales over 3 months "small", your crazy. That is a huge bit of units for the 30% price drop range.

I compared the 3 months before and after, because it'd be a better barometer than just 1 or 2 months. As for consumers hoarding back to buy a given system before the cut, that rarely happens, as every company publically denies price drops, then does it without warning.

Also, there was a recent news item shown here at VGChartz. A video game/technical website (something like forbes) had a big article about the effects of a price drop. Their findings? After the first major price drop, the majority of systems were sold in the US between the first major, and second drops for EVERY last-gen system.

Ultimately, there are lots of factors that others have spoke of - consumer perception, games, ect, ect, but with a restrictive, negitively preceived price by the consumers, no number of games or anything else can really sell more units.

Let me pose this question: Would a 30% price drop on the Xbox 360 or PS3 permanantly increase sales of the systems?

If you answer no, I'd think your crazy, as a 30% drop on the PS3 ($200 USD to $400 USD) would have an imminent effect on the tepid ~80k/mo sales of the system, and would forever, and a 30% price drop ($280 USD for Prem 360), would certainly garner alot more sales too.

Also, by the time a $20 and $30 cut comes, their means of doing such aren't really to capture a huge new userbase for the system, but merely try to re-achieve momentum on the systems, and never have the same kind of consumer reaction a first-strike major (25-30%) drop have. In the case of GC, PS2 and Xbox, the later drops had little effect, as you've pointed out. Why? By that time, consumer perception of the machine is nearly (if not certainly) set, and the price merely keeps it inline with opening up more consumers to buy, but not in a major way outside of maybe Nov-Dec sales.

Another good example would be the X360's $100 price cut for Christmas via retail rebates. With that drop by retailers, the 360 had a very good Christmas - the highest (or 2nd highest) for a Microsoft Christmas, ever.

In the post I pointed out that the 30% price drop was useful, I didn't say it wasn't. Also the first price drop increased sales as well (except for the PSP). I wasn't arguing those points. I agree here. I would not think that a 2k increase of sales on a system that sales 180k a increase, that is why I said 6 out of 9. For me that is a statistical tie.
The part where you said very decisive was - in my opinion - wrong. The only price cut that really counts are the first ones and the ones that are more than 30%. Also the 60% increase was only for the three months, they return to (almost) normal after that. If you check my post I said that a 30% price drop will have a good impact on the number of units sold.
To answer your question: Yes obviously since it is the first price cut. I guess if they have a 30% price cut that will probably make an increase of 50-60%. But I was talking about price cuts in general, all the price cuts not just the first price cut.

In the post I also said that the smaller price cuts were so the momentum doesn't drop. I can't understand your 10th paragraph, if it is a response to me or just a statement.

Regarding the other factors, that was the whole point of this thread, that the other factors are more important than price drops.