I agree that the FGC test is probably the most comprehensive as far as SNP discovery. However there really aren't any guarantees. I've discovered that the "full" Y types of tests don't really cover 100% of the Y chromosome. None do, but with good reasons, including impenetrable and unstable segments of the chromosome and costs. It appears the definition of pseudo-full will change over time. The technology itself is part of the equation. Some SNPs may be positioned such that the current technologies will not read them consistently, accurately. I have both Chromo 2 and Big Y orders in for myself. We won't really know what's what until we see a good number of results and can do the comparisons. The relative pricing between the products is probably relative to their value, at least generally so. Chromo 2 is built on the same technology as Geno 2 but is essentially a "2.1" as they were able to add more identified SNPs. Ultimately, I'm not sure if the pricing isn't about right with FGC at $1250, Big Y at $695, Chromo 2 (raw) at $199, Geno 2 at $159. What has thrown a wrench into the works is FTDNA's introductory price of $495. I was not expecting that price. This reminds me of the high tech industry. There will always be vendors leapfrogging each other, sometimes only in promises, sometimes only by comparing their new version versus someone else's old. You'll probably not buy just one product from any of these companies so I recommend considering the company/institution itself, their long term viability, apparent business model, executives and technical people and succession, product line breadth, modularity and upgrade paths, geographic focus, support, matching databases, etc. etc. I am positive there will be a new package next year or the year that will be better than anything you have to day. The question is who to do business with and when? Well, at least that is my point of view. For genetic genealogists, I think Iain said it very well, "no SNP on the chip is new in any meaningful sense of the word anyway... unless the database also has data". In the end we don't care about many of these SNPs, maybe even most of them. Many will be upstream, many recurrent and many will be phylogenetically equivalent. That's not to say those won't be useful for science in general. Regards, Mike W On Sun, Nov 17, 2013 at 1:40 AM, Iain Kennedy <[email protected]>wrote: > Doug, the only thing we can say reasonably for sure right now is that BigY > isn't guaranteed to fully cover all the regions containing the Chromo2 > SNPs. I think that particular binary choice coupled with the tight deadline > is a difficult one to call. Some people feel they are being bounced into > buying BigY at the cheap intro price unsighted, whereas with the fully > comprehensive FullGenomes test (which would be guaranteed to find all the > Chromo2 SNPs) there was a pilot phase and later customers could talk to the > pilot testers and see their results whilst still getting the early bird > price. > > Iain > > > > > > > Date: Sat, 16 Nov 2013 20:30:44 -0500 > > From: [email protected] > > To: [email protected] > > Subject: Re: [R-M222] A quote from Robert Brooks Casey R1b-L21 at yahoo > forum > > > > As a consumer, let me say that I am annoyed at this lack of clarity. At > > this time I have the option of taking the ScotlandsDNA Chromo2 test > and/or > > the FTDNA Big Y test, but could they essentially duplicate each other? > > > > Doug > > > > > > On Sat, Nov 16, 2013 at 12:06 PM, Iain Kennedy > > <[email protected]>wrote: > > > > > This number of 'new' Geno M222 SNPs must set some kind of record for > the > > > number of times it's changed ;-) > > > > > > It still fails to make any sense since all the ones on the diagram from > > > their talk are already on the Geno 2.0 chip (I checked each one > manually in > > > my Geno file) and no SNP on the chip is new in any meaningful sense of > the > > > word anyway... unless the database also has data that was obtained by > some > > > other method than the Geno 2.0 chip which I'm not aware of. In which > case > > > their list of SNP names was wrong. > > > > > > Not to mention the question of how they will get them through > > >

@ Iain OK, I now plan to take the Chromo2 test, which for the time being seems adequate. Bob Doherty himself welcomed me to the Doherty project, as by genetics I am quite closely related to the main Doherty clann, along with known historical links. Results to my DF85 test and 67 to 111 upgrade should be available in the next week or so. @Mike W My background is in mechanical engineering, and so I can appreciate how test results can vary. But there is no sense in taking two tests which effectively duplicate each other. Doug On Sun, Nov 17, 2013 at 4:01 PM, Mike W <[email protected]> wrote: > I agree that the FGC test is probably the most comprehensive as far as SNP > discovery. > > However there really aren't any guarantees. I've discovered that the > "full" Y types of tests don't really cover 100% of the Y chromosome. None > do, but with good reasons, including impenetrable and unstable segments of > the chromosome and costs. It appears the definition of pseudo-full will > change over time. The technology itself is part of the equation. Some SNPs > may be positioned such that the current technologies will not read them > consistently, accurately. > > I have both Chromo 2 and Big Y orders in for myself. We won't really know > what's what until we see a good number of results and can do the > comparisons. > > The relative pricing between the products is probably relative to their > value, at least generally so. Chromo 2 is built on the same technology as > Geno 2 but is essentially a "2.1" as they were able to add more identified > SNPs. Ultimately, I'm not sure if the pricing isn't about right with FGC at > $1250, Big Y at $695, Chromo 2 (raw) at $199, Geno 2 at $159. What has > thrown a wrench into the works is FTDNA's introductory price of $495. I was > not expecting that price. > > This reminds me of the high tech industry. There will always be vendors > leapfrogging each other, sometimes only in promises, sometimes only by > comparing their new version versus someone else's old. You'll probably not > buy just one product from any of these companies so I recommend considering > the company/institution itself, their long term viability, apparent > business model, executives and technical people and succession, product > line breadth, modularity and upgrade paths, geographic focus, support, > matching databases, etc. etc. I am positive there will be a new package > next year or the year that will be better than anything you have to day. > The question is who to do business with and when? Well, at least that is > my point of view. > > For genetic genealogists, I think Iain said it very well, "no SNP on the > chip is new in any meaningful sense of the word anyway... unless the > database also has data". In the end we don't care about many of these > SNPs, maybe even most of them. Many will be upstream, many recurrent and > many will be phylogenetically equivalent. That's not to say those won't be > useful for science in general. > > Regards, > Mike W > > > > > On Sun, Nov 17, 2013 at 1:40 AM, Iain Kennedy <[email protected] > >wrote: > > > Doug, the only thing we can say reasonably for sure right now is that > BigY > > isn't guaranteed to fully cover all the regions containing the Chromo2 > > SNPs. I think that particular binary choice coupled with the tight > deadline > > is a difficult one to call. Some people feel they are being bounced into > > buying BigY at the cheap intro price unsighted, whereas with the fully > > comprehensive FullGenomes test (which would be guaranteed to find all the > > Chromo2 SNPs) there was a pilot phase and later customers could talk to > the > > pilot testers and see their results whilst still getting the early bird > > price. > > > > Iain > > > > > > > > > > > > > Date: Sat, 16 Nov 2013 20:30:44 -0500 > > > From: [email protected] > > > To: [email protected] > > > Subject: Re: [R-M222] A quote from Robert Brooks Casey R1b-L21 at yahoo > > forum > > > > > > As a consumer, let me say that I am annoyed at this lack of clarity. > At > > > this time I have the option of taking the ScotlandsDNA Chromo2 test > > and/or > > > the FTDNA Big Y test, but could they essentially duplicate each other? > > > > > > Doug > > > > > > > > > On Sat, Nov 16, 2013 at 12:06 PM, Iain Kennedy > > > <[email protected]>wrote: > > > > > > > This number of 'new' Geno M222 SNPs must set some kind of record for > > the > > > > number of times it's changed ;-) > > > > > > > > It still fails to make any sense since all the ones on the diagram > from > > > > their talk are already on the Geno 2.0 chip (I checked each one > > manually in > > > > my Geno file) and no SNP on the chip is new in any meaningful sense > of > > the > > > > word anyway... unless the database also has data that was obtained by > > some > > > > other method than the Geno 2.0 chip which I'm not aware of. In which > > case > > > > their list of SNP names was wrong. > > > > > > > > Not to mention the question of how they will get them through > > > > > > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >