Well, the whole thing is 64-bit and 32-bit, from top to bottom, and all at the same time (there is no 64 bit version and 32 bit version). That's a pretty big improvement in the system. And core animation.
Quicklook is nice, and Time Machine is a fundamentally better way of backing up. It really makes it painless, more reliable and easier to access old files. (Best to get an airport and plug in a drive, though.) It is a technologically different way of backing up. You should see the article on it at appleinsider.com (among it's other road to Leopard articles).
One of the cool things is that all these features work together. Spotlight to search, Time Machine to enable searching back in time, and Quicklook to make sure it's what you are really looking for before restoring it. Pretty sweet actually.
Regarding the original question, I plan to get it when I use my $100 iPhone credit to buy a new $2,000+ iMac at or around launch.
I can't get over that two known bugs thing. I mean, I've run it (to do a 5 minute demo as part of a practice speech for Toastmasters), and Addressbook fails to launch, Mail crashes (and flips between using 0 bytes and 16 TB), and eventually it won't even boot. So, I won't be doing the demo and I've just wiped it off my system. That was a fun weekend. :frowning: Slide show instead now.
I'm almost excited enough to use a dancing banana. Almost.
I'm looking forward to the early feedback on installation experience and any software conflicts. I want to buy it straight away if there are no serious negative reports.
Apparently the academic price they charge on their online store is different than what you might get at your local university.
They were selling iWork 08 and iLife 08 online for an "academic price" of $71 (a whopping $8 off $79 MSRP). But in my university store they were $39 (as were previous versions). Macrumors updated their reporting of academic pricing for Leopard to say that I fully expect this to be $69 at the student store.
My upgrade from Panther to Tiger 2 years ago went flawlessly. With that experience bolstering my confidence, I'll be buying Leopard next Friday, so I have all weekend to check it out.