Goldman Sachs is reporting what sounds like good news for Xbox sales: That more stores are sold out of it than of Nintendo's GameCube. It looks like good news, until you look a little deeper.

TeamXbox has a story quoting a Goldman Sachs survey of retailers, stating that 73% had sold out of the Xbox, compared to only 47% sold out of GameCubes:

The survey was conducted among 49 retail chain stores in large cities, said Goldman, which speculated that the difference in inventory levels could be traced back to the amount of consoles the stores initially received. Microsoft was estimated to have shipped 300,000 Xbox units.

Only three hundred thousand? What happened to eight hundred thousand?

Microsoft's initial estimate was between 600,000 and 800,000 units available for launch. As the date neared, articles speculated that the number would be half that. But in the final hours before and after the launch, there were articles indicating that Microsoft had hit its intial numbers. Now, Goldman Sachs seems to confirm that not only has the GameCube possibly doubled the Xbox's sales figures, but that they had over twice as many units to sell as Microsoft did.

That could be good and bad. It might mean that there will be pent-up demand for the Xbox if Microsoft can deliver more units-- FAST. Or it might signal supply problems that will ensconce Nintendo in the number two spot in the console market behind Sony.