I asked awhile back for advice on which DNA test(s) to order ... my 97 year old aunt was willing and she is the last of her generation on that side of the family. Given her age and tendency to dehydrate, we've ordered the autosomal DNA kit from FamilyTreeDNA, which uses a cheek swab rather than spitting into a cup (or whatever), plus they keep the DNA for many years, in case new tests become available. She hasn't done hers yet, but I just did the same test and sent it in yesterday. Anyone have any idea how long I'll be waiting for my results? Obviously we won't have hers until after she tests. :-) Meanwhile, given the feedback here about how many more matches one can get doing the Ancestry DNA test... I think I know that I can migrate results from Ancestry to FamilyTreeDNA, but can it work the other way? Or if I want the benefits of having my DNA available at Ancestry, do I also need to do an Ancestry DNA test? And if I do, will I learn anything different from the DNA itself, or the advantage is just that my same old same old DNA will be usable on Ancestry? Obviously still a newbie at this, LOL! Karen karen@mtpinos.com

I have had my DNA kit back from Ancestry for a few weeks now, and a few days ago received the results from a brother's kit. All in all we are doing 6 total from my family. Both my brother and I had approximately 300 matches to names in my database as well as several thousand possible mentions that do not name exact names of the matches (lists surnames in common) On the Ancestry site it indicates that only about 32% of possible DNA matches turn up in a single kit, having something to do with the number of DNA strands in sequence that need to match to another person's. Since different siblings and other family members have different DNA sequences, several kits are likely to bring about more matches. From what I have learned, comparing matches between my brother and myself, it appears we have at least 20 new ones that were not reported in my kit. I expect to find more. I have two other siblings with kits in process along with my son and a granddaughter. Next I am hoping for a first cousin to participate. One frustration I have found is people with whom I am highly genetically related, have no family trees online at Ancestry or for some reason have chosen to lock their databases. The better databases we have, the more we will all be able to match our names and prove some of our questionable paper links. The cost is $99 plus shipping. One of my families with whom I had a questionable link at the 3rd great grandmother level, proved to be accurate with 4 generations in a row matching perfectly. After working on this family for at least 15 years, the test was well worth the price, even if there had not been other matches. It is fun to get the ethnicity report which does not require a database, but what I find the most interesting is the matching going back to 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th great grandparents. I am not sure about transferring the results from one program to another. To compare between several family members , it is probably best to have various family members test from the same place and one person administer the project using one database. To those of us who have been researching for many years, this is an exciting, new way to prove our ancestry. It makes me so happy, that most of my work generation to the next generation is being proved to have the correct grandparents, great grandparents, etc. as one progresses up the tree. We all can make parent-child mistakes in the progress of our research, and thus not be proving what we think we are proving as to our own ancestors. Margaret Scheffler -----Original Message----- From: Karen Isaacson Leverich via Sent: Tuesday, April 05, 2016 3:03 PM I asked awhile back for advice on which DNA test(s) to order ... my 97 year old aunt was willing and she is the last of her generation on that side of the family. Given her age and tendency to dehydrate, we've ordered the autosomal DNA kit from FamilyTreeDNA, which uses a cheek swab rather than spitting into a cup (or whatever), plus they keep the DNA for many years, in case new tests become available. She hasn't done hers yet, but I just did the same test and sent it in yesterday. Anyone have any idea how long I'll be waiting for my results? Obviously we won't have hers until after she tests. :-) Meanwhile, given the feedback here about how many more matches one can get doing the Ancestry DNA test... I think I know that I can migrate results from Ancestry to FamilyTreeDNA, but can it work the other way? Or if I want the benefits of having my DNA available at Ancestry, do I also need to do an Ancestry DNA test? And if I do, will I learn anything different from the DNA itself, or the advantage is just that my same old same old DNA will be usable on Ancestry? Obviously still a newbie at this, LOL! Karen karen@mtpinos.com

Hi Karen, it should be about 6-10 weeks before you get your results. You cannot migrate your results from FTDNA to Ancestry.  If you want your DNA at Ancestry, then you must test there.  The benefit to testing at Ancestry is that they have a different database of matches (though there will be some people who have tested at both or all 3 companies).  Ancestry forms "DNA Circles" by comparing the trees of people who have tested along with their DNA results to speculate that you are related to a particular match through a common ancestor.  The downside is that they don't give you your segment data (positions on your genome where you are matching others); it is difficult to define a relationship with someone based on your shared DNA (even tentatively) without this information - at best.  The upside, again, is that a lot of people who have put in the time and effort to trace their family histories have trees at Ancestry, and Ancestry will do the comparisons to find those common ancestors.  If your Ancestry match transfers her kit to gedmatch, the two of you can see where on your genomes you are matching and reap the benefits of testing at both companies. Barton On Tue, Apr 05, 2016 at 03:03 PM, Karen Isaacson Leverich via wrote: > I asked awhile back for advice on which DNA test(s) to order ... my 97 > year old aunt was willing and she is the last of her generation on > that side of the family. Given her age and tendency to dehydrate, > we've ordered the autosomal DNA kit from FamilyTreeDNA, which uses a > cheek swab rather than spitting into a cup (or whatever), plus they > keep the DNA for many years, in case new tests become available. She > hasn't done hers yet, but I just did the same test and sent it in > yesterday. Anyone have any idea how long I'll be waiting for my > results? Obviously we won't have hers until after she tests. :-) > > Meanwhile, given the feedback here about how many more matches one can > get doing the Ancestry DNA test... I think I know that I can migrate > results from Ancestry to FamilyTreeDNA, but can it work the other way? > Or if I want the benefits of having my DNA available at Ancestry, do I > also need to do an Ancestry DNA test? And if I do, will I learn > anything different from the DNA itself, or the advantage is just that > my same old same old DNA will be usable on Ancestry? > > Obviously still a newbie at this, LOL! > > Karen > karen@mtpinos.com > ===== > If you would prefer digest mode to mail mode, drop a note to > roots-admin@rootsweb.com and ask for the digest... > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > ROOTS-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the > quotes in the subject and the body of the message >

I'm still confused as to which DNA test is the best to use. My brother is willing to do the testing on my Father's Family. Which DNA test is best to use to get the best results, FTMDNA or Ancestry? Need some help here!! Thanks, Carolyn Flint Garner ---- Karen Isaacson Leverich via <roots@rootsweb.com> wrote: > I asked awhile back for advice on which DNA test(s) to order ... my 97 year old aunt was willing and she is the last of her generation on that side of the family. Given her age and tendency to dehydrate, we've ordered the autosomal DNA kit from FamilyTreeDNA, which uses a cheek swab rather than spitting into a cup (or whatever), plus they keep the DNA for many years, in case new tests become available. She hasn't done hers yet, but I just did the same test and sent it in yesterday. Anyone have any idea how long I'll be waiting for my results? Obviously we won't have hers until after she tests. :-) > > Meanwhile, given the feedback here about how many more matches one can get doing the Ancestry DNA test... I think I know that I can migrate results from Ancestry to FamilyTreeDNA, but can it work the other way? Or if I want the benefits of having my DNA available at Ancestry, do I also need to do an Ancestry DNA test? And if I do, will I learn anything different from the DNA itself, or the advantage is just that my same old same old DNA will be usable on Ancestry? > > Obviously still a newbie at this, LOL! > > Karen > karen@mtpinos.com > ===== > If you would prefer digest mode to mail mode, drop a note to roots-admin@rootsweb.com and ask for the digest... > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to ROOTS-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message