Most bang for the DNA buck

Justin Durand Very useful and informative---thanks so much for sharing!

Thank you for sharing this Justin Durand. It will be helpful for users contemplating testing their DNA.

Individuals doing FTDNA testing for Jewish ancestry are welcome to contact me for special discounting.

Now Judy's recommendations specifically for autosomal ("Family Finder") testing.

http://dna-explained.com/2015/02/05/autosomal-dna-2015-which-test-i...

She lists the good and the bad. FTDNA comes out on top. No surprise there. The surprise is that she ranks 23andme a distant third, behind even Ancestry.com. I would quibble, but I don't she's wrong.

While I too would definitely recommend testing with FTDNA over the others, the one upside of 23andme is that the results will include your mtDNA halogroup and Ydna for males at a much lower rate than testing those two things individually on FTDNA.

However, 23andme doesn't include as much info as FTDNA does on those and doesn't show you how distant or close you are to others who match your halotype. Of course, you are agreeing to let 23andme anonymously use your dna.

My head is still swirling after reading this. I've got my 23 and me test and I'd like to buy a few tests for other family members. Maybe I ought to still with them.

Do you know where I can buy a test for a reasonable price? Is Family Tree DNA open for purchase to anyone?

Daniel, yes. Anyone can buy from Family Tree DNA (or from 23andme). Both are reasonably priced and both are good choices.

Another nice comparison of Autosomal Tests currently being offered:
http://www.isogg.org/wiki/Autosomal_DNA_testing_comparison_chart

Good find Private User

One very common question I get is about the test that will should where your ancestors came from. That's an autosomal test. This is the only test offered by 23and me. Family Tree DNA calls it a Family Finder test. Lois' link is a good comparison for those two and for other companies.

As a genealogist, you want to be able to export your data to Gedmatch. Only three of the five companies let you do that -- 23andme, Family Tree DNA, and Ancestry.com.

There is also a slight difference in emphasis that might matter to some people. When they are predicting where your ancestors lived, 23andme tries to figure out where they were living about 500 years ago, while FTDNA tries to figure out where they were living about 1000 years ago.

Also, 23andme is much more likely to come up with very small slices of ancestry, while FTDNA goes for the bigger picture.

and now ancestry is also only doing family finder no mt-dna or y dna.

Unfortunately Ancestry has made so many missteps along the way that it's hard to get anyone to trust the direction they're going.

Someone in one of my groups posted a funny story not long ago. They said it is like Ancestry promised a new top of the line car, then delivered a bicycle. When people complained Ancestry said it's a Mercedes bicycle and anyway you shouldn't want a car ;)

I think that pretty well sums up what most of us are thinking these days.

Justin Durand That's funny and so true! I was part of Ancestry's beta group for their autosomal testing and sent them some pretty serious, not so positive feedback.

I tried autosomal at ancestry Private User Justin Durand didn't get much out of it that was worth it a few connections but nothing that panned out surname wise.. as for the break down they did not provide anything that was in the least bit supprising.. and made it hard to under stand and digest didn't even provide me with a happle group or anything... I allready knew some of what i was getting into at least on my dad's side they said 45% irish I knew that my fathers dad family had been in ireland for at least 100-150 years prior to them comming to the us so it wasn't a total shock but the percentage level was....

Thanks folks, but I think this whole field is full of confusion. Maybe I am just projecting my confusion on everyone else.

The Ancestry test with over 3,000,000 test stored and connected to people, many with trees is hard to beat if you are trying to find living relatives or verify you tree structures for a few generations. For deep ancestry the Geno-2.0 test from NG is wonderful for men. It is not there for genealogy, but it will give us men the opportunity to eliminate folks from and maybe include possible people in your mother or father line. There is a problem with this also. The test from 23andMe and FTDNA give Y haplogroups that are further back in the time that the latest and all these look like different lines when they are not. ie I am R-CTS4299 and the last 2 postings I have seen R-L51 and R-Z198 are in my line. Unfortunately there are hundreds of other SNPs that are valid ... in FTDNA what I see most often is R-M269 (now these are derived from STR test and I don't know their reliability. Sorry for this rant, but I believe this is true.
Ron Henderson

Ron, I don't know that I would put much stock in admixture results no matter where they come from. The underlying methodology is a bit hinky. The experts keep warning, but the testing companies like them because customers like them so much.

Hah, that reminded me that I had ordered myself an Ancestry kit many many months ago.

Mostly because of the possibility of finding a cousin on the Mintz / Davis or Petticrew / Kenny sides.

Ancestry really paid off for me in terms of new relatives. More than I would have thought. Too bad they don't make it easy to compare the technical detail.

What surprised me more than anything is they are the ones who came up with "Genetic Communities". They were able to figure out (correctly) that I'm tied genetically to "Early Settlers of the Ohio River Valley" and "Mormon Pioneers in the Mountain West".

Yep, that about sums up the main lines.

Yes, I think Ancestry will do well for the Scots Irish and the Welsh / Dutch lines.

We haven't talked about Gedmatch https://www.gedmatch.com/login1.php

This is the biggest bang for the buck in that they are free. You must have tested somewhere else, and then you can upload your DNA here and get more matching.

I have uploaded a lot of family from 3 different testing platforms.
I am A336303 Ronald Lee Henderson.

I am always interested in finding living cousins.
Ron