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The $29 Snow Leopard upgrade: usable for 10.4 Intel Macs as well?


Walt Mossberg has answered a Snow Leopard upgrade question that has been on just about everyone's mind.

Do you need the full $169 box set if you are upgrading from Tiger? The answer is apparently no, not exactly, although that is what's required by Apple's EULA. You will be able to install the $29 individual upgrade or $49 family upgrade on any Intel Mac regardless of whether it's already running Leopard. According to Uncle Walt, as posted on the All Things Digital site:

"Apple concedes that the $29 Snow Leopard upgrade will work properly on these Tiger-equipped Macs, so you can save the extra $140."

What's not 100% clear from this report is whether the Snow Leopard install would work as an upgrade, or only as a clean install (on a newly formatted drive), as Lifehacker suggests. Since some experienced Mac users prefer to do a clean install with every major OS upgrade -- either reinstalling apps and files from backup, or using Migration Assistant to pull over from the old configuration -- this may not be a drawback for everyone. Wired's preview of Snow Leopard (based on a pre-release version of the OS) suggests that they were able to do an upgrade install from 10.4 straight to 10.6 using the conventional SL disc, but your mileage may vary.

So there you have it. If you have Leopard running on your Intel machine, you will be fine with the $29 single or $49 family versions on sale Friday morning. If you're willing to wipe down your Tiger install and start fresh, the $29 installer will probably work for you too -- but you'll be in violation of Apple's licensing agreement, making you an OS pirate. Just so you know.


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Snow Leopard

Walt Mossberg has answered a Snow Leopard upgrade question that has been on just about everyone's mind. Do you need the full $169 box...
 

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Steve Lerro

I bought the $30 snow leopard disk and upgraded 100% from 10.4 to 10.6

The following month, I bought a 500gb harddrive for my macbook and did a free install of 10.6

The $30 disk is proven to be an upgrade from at least 10.4 and a full install if being used on a new internal harddrive.

Steve

March 16 2011 at 12:16 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
HB_Dad

Does anyone know if I were to use the $29 Snow Leopard upgrade to update from Tiger, will my old iPhoto and iMovie still work or would they be broken?

September 06 2010 at 3:01 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to HB_Dad's comment
Steve Lerro

Your old iLife software will work just fine! Mine did from 10.4-10.6

March 16 2011 at 12:20 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
CJWright

I have all my videos on iMovie 06 HD and the DVD versions on the 06 version as well. I bought a Snow Leopard mac enticed by previews of iMovie 09, only to find it's dumbed down. So now stuck with files on an overburdened g4. I am pretty sure I loaded iMovie o6 HD on the new Mac, but then the iDVD 06 files wouldn't even open, and were supposed Locked (this option was not checked off on the GetInfo box.) I uninstalled iDVD 09 and reinstalled iDVD 06, hoping then to use it for the iMovie HD. Surprise, error message saying that the iDVD 06 would not even work with Snow Leopard.

So, all my iDVD projects are stuck on the old G4 with Tiger? is there a third party program to make iDVD work in SL? or should I load Tiger on a partition in the new Mac (not something I've done myself, but will get someone to do it, I guess...) Is that my solution? At least I'd have a more power computer to work on the old videos.

If this is an example of Apple's innovative thinking, then I wish I had never abandoned Windows. Well, I haven't actually, and do my HD editing on Vegas, but so much early stuff is in iMovie.

April 25 2010 at 8:50 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
KentR

@Tony:

Format? That sounds like a clean install (aka "erase & install") rather than installing over Tiger. No?

September 30 2009 at 1:54 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Tony

How to install over tiger:
1. Make backup of data
2. Boot off of the DVD holding down option at startup. (yesh it is bootable!)
3. Open Disk Utility, format the hard drive as Macintosh Extended Journaled
4. Install!

August 30 2009 at 11:18 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
David Winograd

Because iLife '09 requires Leopard, so if someone only has Tiger and bought iLife '09 all they get is a pretty box.

August 27 2009 at 5:13 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
mikehild

Here's the big problem I have with the idea of requiring Tiger users to buy the full pack with iLife '09. What about people who already bought '09? Apple's forcing them to buy it AGAIN? True there's also iWork included, but not everyone would have a use for it and would consider it a waste of money.

August 27 2009 at 3:13 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Binja

It works as an upgrade from Tiger. I have it. I have done it. It works.

August 27 2009 at 2:11 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Tyrone Rugen

Does anyone know if you can install Boot Camp with the 10.6 Snow Leopard disc, or does that still require the 10.5 Leopard disc?

August 27 2009 at 1:49 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Hanoch

How do you know this violates the Snow Leopard license agreement? I took a look at Apple's software license website page (http://www.apple.com/legal/sla/) but did not see the license agreement for Snow Leopard listed.

August 27 2009 at 12:26 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Hanoch's comment
Ryan Trevisol

All googling for it only turns up people slamming Mossberg. I don't think we have it yet. I'd like someone to post a link to the EULA so we can all read it.

But we'll all have that opportunity tomorrow I assume.

August 27 2009 at 1:08 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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