> Plan is to buy 2 new (have decided on new, now) Macs which will come with SL pre-installed.
Bear in mind that it's crunch-time... With the imminent release of Lion, the supply of new Macs with Snow Leopard pre-installed will probably not last long, particularly in view of the fact that major users of PPC apps may decide to buy new now to avoid buying, i.e. being stuck with, Lion later.
> Will the instal/system disks which come with the NEW machines, instal SL on them, or do I have to ALSO buy SL black/retail discs?
The discs that come with any Mac install at least the latest operating system (*) (**) plus bundled software; there is no need to buy black discs other than to upgrade your current version of OS X.
(*) The have been instances, and we may see another of them soon, in which Macs with one version of OS X pre-installed that were sold immediately after the release of a new version of OS X came with upgrade, not install discs. (Edit 2: Hmmm... I wonder if upgrades, if made available, will be available other than through the Mac App Store? Same issue with dial-up and bandwidth caps, though, I guess.)
Edit: (**) The latest version of OS X as of the date of manufacture, that is.
Last edited by artie505; 07/15/11 10:24 AM.
