14-day Free Leopard upgrade

[DaveTurnbull]

Hi,

I'm buying my first ever Mac (a Macbook Pro) and I'd heard that if I buy it, and within 14-days Leopard is released I get a free upgrade.

1. Is this true?
2. Is it available in all countries? (I'm Australian)
3. Does Apple have a page where I can read about this policy?
4. How do you get the free upgrade? Just a download?

Thanks.

 

[robbieduncan]

Please do a search. This exact question (free upgrades to Leopard) is being asked somewhere between 30 and 100 times a day at the moment.

In short the answer is:

There is no set timeframe like 14 days. In the past it has been defined as all Macs purchased after a shipping date for the new OS is announced (which has been up to a month in the past). So as no shipping date is yet announced any Mac purchase now would not qualify.

The upgrades have been available by sending a form to Apple who post you the upgrade. This has cost between $10 and $20 (USD not AUD) in the past for postage and has been available in most countries.

When the up-to-date program is announced it is on the website, but as the program is different for each release there is no standing page with this on it.

 

[twoodcc]

just wait until the date is announced. hopefully sometime this week

 

[andrewag]

Apple have said October, after delaying it in April will be the month the new OS is shipped in. I'm fairly certain Apple will go to great lengths making sure they meet the target, so it's probably best to just hold out on your purchase just that bit longer.

Most people do say "if you need it now, just buy it" but this close I would advise against it. People have been known to write to Apple in their country and got the free upgrade in the past.

I wish Apple would have an upgrade price for Mac OS X. I know it's pretty cheap for an OS, but for those of us who upgrade for every release it's pretty pathetic there is no upgrade path. What are those proof of purchase coupons even for!

 

[robbieduncan]

I wish Apple would have an upgrade price for Mac OS X. I know it's pretty cheap for an OS, but for those of us who upgrade for every release it's pretty pathetic there is no upgrade path. What are those proof of purchase coupons even for!

All retail copies are effectively upgrades at upgrade price as they are only licensed for Apple branded machines which, therefore, came with a version of Mac OS on it.

The last time the coupons were used for anything was the free upgrade to 10.1 made available to 10.0 users. But then 10.0 was almost unusable and 10.1 came out about 6 months after 10.0!