AMP (Apple Maintenance Program) Question

[torrid30]

Hello all,

I'm new to the forums here, as this is my frist post, but I had a question dealing with the AMP (Apple Maintenance Program). I'm curious to what it actually does, and is it worth getting.

My situation is that I need to purchase a new computer as my last one overheated and burned the motherboard becuase two of the fans stopped working. And now I really want to transfer over to Mac. I'm holding off on buying one just yet because I've had my eye on the iMac but they are upgrading them soon, hopefully.

Now my situation is I would be getting OSX 10.4 only a few months before Leopards release, so I am wondering if Apple ever offers a program, similar to many PC retailers did with a "buy now and get a free upgrade to Vista upon release"? Or if I get the Mac before Leopard, I'd then have to buy Leopard as well, which I am assuming is $129.99 as all the other upgrades have been and as many people are claiming it to cost.

This all brings me back to AMP, because being a student in college, my school offers AMP for $65.00 which includes free updates for all Apple software until sometime in 2008. The actual Program Description says:

"You MUST own a valid Tiger license to enroll in the Apple Maintenance Program (AMP) and this option entitles you to all Apple operating system updates/upgrades until September 22, 2008."

And then goes on to say every major OS upgrade costs $69.00 (Educational) and they usually release one or two of these per year. So, I think I am ending up ahead in the end. Unless "major OS upgrade" isn't Leopard as that seems to be a separate thing you must purchase separately.

So out of all of this there are two main questions:
1) Does Apple offer anything such as "buy now and get free upgrade later"?
and
2) Anyone who is familiar with AMP, does this include Leopard when it says "OS upgrades" and is this "Educational" price also referring to what Leopard would cost to me, being a student and buying through my school's software site.

Thank you, and here is the link to the site that explains AMP from my school.
http://www.cites.uiuc.edu/software/amp.html

PS - not sure if posting links to outside sites is "illegal" to this forum, and if it is I apologize in advance.

 

[Eidorian]

I've come across this program as well. Leopard would be considered a major OS upgrade.

 

[torrid30]

I've come across this program as well. Leopard would be considered a major OS upgrade.

And so therefore a Leopard upgrade would fall under the upgrades provided through AMP? I just guess I don't understand how it works, do they just send me a Leopard disc when it is released? Or would it be availiable through download (because the site says OSX is too large to offer as a download, and I'd assume the same for Leopard) but I could be wrong.

 

[Eidorian]

Leopard would fall under the upgrades for AMP. They'd more then likely send you a disc.

 

[torrid30]

Leopard would fall under the upgrades for AMP. They'd more then likely send you a disc.

Alright, thank you very much for your prompt responses, this helps me understand the program much better.

Thank you!

 

[Eidorian]

Alright, thank you very much for your prompt responses, this helps me understand the program much better.

Thank you!

Note: We have this program at my campus as well. I just fall under the site license for software already. Kinda redundant to pay for this when I already use department hardware.