Monthly Visitor - NPD Sales for October

[Malak]

Most failed units get refurbished and sent back out. Replacements sent out by MS don't count as sales. So the massive failure rate really shouldn't skew the numbers that much... unless you really think millions of people just tossed them in the trash and bought new ones at retail.

Actually, yeah, lots of people did. Multiple times. It was only a 1 year warranty when it came out, and that was about the lifespan of the box. Most people didn't want to pay for the repairs, worried about having to do it again, so they bought new ones. This was when the RRoD was just starting and nobody knew that only a third of the xbox's were even leaving the factory. I heard of people buying half a dozen xbox's before mine finally bit the dust. This was all before M$ extended the warranties and started to try and cover up their HUGE mistake. With my warranty expired, I tucked my xbox in the box my PS3 came in and tossed it. I heard enough horror stories on the live forums to know when to make the switch. And there hasn't been a single exclusive 360 game to come out that I cared about.

 

[mugs]

You guys are hilarious.

If you want to estimate the relative population of consoles that are still in use, just look at the tie ratios, or at sales for a sample of games. People who threw out their consoles stop buying games, and people who replace their console with a new one don't replace all of their games.

 

[Dari]

I don't get your line of thinking. The 360 had a 3 year warranty for the RROD. I would be willing to bet that the majority of broken 360's were repaired or replaced on warranty. The replacements are refurb units and even if they were brand new they wouldn't be counted because they were not shipped to stores.

How many times would something be 'repaired' before you went out and bought a new one?

 

[Dari]

You guys are hilarious.

If you want to estimate the relative population of consoles that are still in use, just look at the tie ratios, or at sales for a sample of games. People who threw out their consoles stop buying games, and people who replace their console with a new one don't replace all of their games.

Not everyone buys games for their consoles...at least many games. Just look at the Wii. It's the same type of 'games' year after year. I don't buy any for my Wii or PS3 aside from a few $10-20 used games once or twice a year. But I used my PS3 almost daily now. I cannot speak for others but I'm assuming that a lot of people use their PS3 more as a media hub than a game station.

 

[BenSkywalker]

The 360 has a 1 year lead and countless re-buys from their 66% failure rate right out the door. Their sales are too skewed to compare to PS3 sales. Forget sales, let's see active gamertags versus active PSN accounts. That's the only real comparison.

The best comparison is probably tie rate, and the 360 is still ahead of the PS3 there too in the US by a reasonable margin(10.4-8.4). On a global basis the 360 is heading for third place at a relatively decent clip, but in the US Sony has a long ways to go.

Just look at the Wii. It's the same type of 'games' year after year.

Unlike say, the 360 where COD is the best selling game this year, followed by Halo which is nothing like 2008 where COD was the best selling game, followed by Halo which is again nothing at all like 2007 when COD was the best selling game, followed by Halo All the systems have issues with just having the same types of games over and over again. The difference is, most of us on this forum tend to like the types of games that come out on the 360/PS3 and not so much with the Wii.

I cannot speak for others but I'm assuming that a lot of people use their PS3 more as a media hub than a game station.

When looking at time on market, the PS3 actually outsells the 360 as far as games are concerned on a global basis. People tend to buy games more frequently on their PS3 then their 360 for comparable ownership periods. This may have something to do with the piracy factor, but the PS3 at the moment is pushing the fastest relative sales per installed based.

Why would anyone throw out a Nintendo product ? I bet 90% of Nintendo's 20 year old products still work.

Very true, excpet the damn VB. The electronics still work fine, I have two of them that can't be used because of the flimsy ass stand they came with

 

[Bryf50]

Actually, yeah, lots of people did. Multiple times. It was only a 1 year warranty when it came out, and that was about the lifespan of the box. Most people didn't want to pay for the repairs, worried about having to do it again, so they bought new ones. This was when the RRoD was just starting and nobody knew that only a third of the xbox's were even leaving the factory. I heard of people buying half a dozen xbox's before mine finally bit the dust. This was all before M$ extended the warranties and started to try and cover up their HUGE mistake. With my warranty expired, I tucked my xbox in the box my PS3 came in and tossed it. I heard enough horror stories on the live forums to know when to make the switch. And there hasn't been a single exclusive 360 game to come out that I cared about.

So even though you had an xbox still in warranty that could be repaired for free. You just decided to toss your then $400 item. Why do I have a hard time believing you?

How many times would something be 'repaired' before you went out and bought a new one?

Do you really think a considerable amount of people bought a new xbox when it could be fixed or replaced free of charge?

 

[Dari]

So even though you had an xbox still in warranty that could be repaired for free. You just decided to toss your then $400 item. Why do I have a hard time believing you?

Do you really think a considerable amount of people bought a new xbox when it could be fixed or replaced free of charge?

After the 3rd, 4th or 5th 'repair' I'd be on the lookout for something better. Look at how many people on this forum have admitted to just going out and buying a 'Jasper' unit. Remember that massive 'Jasper' thread? That spoke to the dreams and aspirations of millions of XBOX owners who wanted a system that just works.

 

[Malak]

So even though you had an xbox still in warranty that could be repaired for free. You just decided to toss your then $400 item. Why do I have a hard time believing you?

My Xbox wasn't in warranty.

Do you really think a considerable amount of people bought a new xbox when it could be fixed or replaced free of charge?

Back in the day, they couldn't be fixed free of charge. If you were around on the Live forums back then, you'd know that yes a lot of people did buy new Xbox's to replace their broken ones. It was at the point that people didn't trust the refurbished crap being sent back to them that ended up dying again anyway, and people were sick of losing their console for 2-3 weeks at a time. There are more dead Xbox's than live ones.