Leopard Season

So, I see that about 50 of the 126 items that survived my Bayesian RSS filter are about Leopard being released on the 26th, so I expect that I will spend all week being bombarded by hype about it.

Although (like many others) I expect the definitive word to be John Siracusa’s, I have already given up on most of my five wishes for it and am patiently waiting for 10.5.1.

Yes, already. I think it’s “Service Pack Syndrome” from Vista. Or maybe it’s because we’re already at 10.4.10 and there are still things going awry now and then.

The thing is, although I’m sure to upgrade at least one of my machines to it as soon as I get a copy, I’ve already decided it won’t be the one I rely upon the most (i.e., my black MacBook, which is where anything more exciting than reading mail or surfing the web happens these days).

At this point, I’ll probably wipe my 1.8GHz “G5“Tiger, 20” iMac clean, boost it to 2GB RAM (which means finding a good home for the existing 1GB) and let things settle. I expect the usual tussles with getting my HP PSC 950 to both print and scan, but I’d rather get those over with up front and see how Leopard behaves on a PowerPC with a decent screen.

So I’m looking at US$129 for Leopard and US$123 for 2GB RAM (at Crucial prices). Given that the Euro is strong now, I’m betting on the whole thing going for something around Eur. 190-220, depending on where I buy, shipping, etc.

Given the usual delay in getting anything Apple here in Portugal, the whole thing will probably make a nice Xmas present for myself.

Which reminds me: I’ve been meaning to comment upon this piece by Pedro Telles regarding Interlog’s reasons (or lack thereof, according to his piece) for not keeping the retail channels stocked with Macs.

I’ve recently been alerted that Apple gear will now be available in Vobis, and most of it seems to be in stock, but I’m curious as to how long that will last (even though it is an apparent contradiction – and effective debunking – of Pedro’s piece).

Basically, if it is true that there is a clause in the distribution contract giving Apple “right to termination and to establish an official representation in Portugal if and when sales reach a certain level during a year”, I’m not surprised it wasn’t reached yet. Even if the Vobis deal significantly boosts Apple’s reach here (it’s as if they doubled their retail presence overnight).

Why?

Well, because three of my friends are still waiting for their previously ordered iMacs to be delivered, and for some reason I got eleven different e-mails over the weekend mentioning that yes, iLife is now somewhat available in Lisbon (in a single store, and apparently already sold out, and no, the Vobis deal doesn’t appear to cover software).

And all of them inquired if I knew anything about new hardware shipments (you know how it is, once you’re the fourth hit for a Google search for Apple and Portugal, people sorta get to know your site…).

I guess nobody bothered to check Vobis – which kind of came off left field, since nobody expected them to carry Apple gear – they’re somewhat upmarket and Interlog used to be part of the Sonae group along with them, but they’ve been a PC-only shop for so much time and are so un-Apple in terms of shop layouts and branding that it caught everyone by surprise…

And I’m very curious as to whether the iMacs they are selling already ship with proper Portuguese keyboards (there was a sad circus act with the initial ones, with people getting old keyboards instead of the new thin ones).

But getting back to the tally: that makes fourteen people wanting to buy Macs that I know of. Not a statistically significant sample, of course, but considering that I know of at least ten other people who are waiting for Leopard to get theirs (incidentally, two others really had to replace their laptops, gave up waiting, and are stuck in Vista hell and Ubuntu purgatory), the numbers become interesting at best.

Plus I suppose I could add the ones that have already decided (naïvely, in my view) to wait for Xmas to get one, in hope that it will arrive inside anything resembling the holiday season.

Well, Easter is a holiday, right?