Most of the Mac buzz this week concerns the imminent release of Snow Leopard, but the rumoured tablet is still getting attention.

Snow Leopard goes on sale this Friday (August 28), so with any luck I'll have some first-hand observations by next week.

One person purporting to be relaying information from Apple say the $A39 upgrade is exactly that - an upgrade that will only install on top of 10.5. But another says Apple told them the opposite. (I'm writing this out of hours, so I can't go directly to Apple for a definitive answer.)

I hope the latter is correct, because otherwise starting from scratch would mean installing Leopard and then Snow Leopard, making the job even more time consuming. At least that task isn't a common one. The last time I needed to do it was after replacing a hard drive.

Since the Mac Box Set is aimed at Tiger users (it contains Snow Leopard, iLife 09 and iWork 09), presumably that installer will work from bare metal regardless of what happens with the upgrade disc.

As for the tablet, multiple US publications are reporting that Steve Jobs has taken an active role in the project and is cracking the whip on the team.

Most - if not all - of these stories are based on a Wall Street Journal article which asserted that the advertising and marketing side has come in for particular scrutiny from Jobs.

If that's true (and apparently Jobs has told the WSJ that many of its 'facts' were wrong), that does suggest to me that the project is well advanced and that an early 2010 launch really is feasible.

Wouldn't it be ironic if Apple released the tablet in January, the traditional time for Macworld Expo? Apple's no longer attending Macworld, and the organisers have shifted the event to February. Part of Apple's reasoning was reportedly that it wanted to free its release schedule from another company's timetable.

Or would Apple launch the tablet to coincide with or immediately precede Macworld Expo's opening as a way of further downplaying the Expo's significance?