Apple Releases Mac OS X 10.6.3 Update

Apple yesterday released the latest update to Mac OS X, squashing a litany of issues ranging from Time Machine stability to Antarctic daylight savings adjustments. As seems to be the norm these days, the update files are huge, and you have several options for the installation. No matter which option you choose, you need to be backed up fully before installing any major update—you should always be backed up.

Depending on your machine’s configuration, the file sizes range from about 415MB to almost 900MB. My MacBook Pro running 10.6.2 downloaded the smallest of the updates, as it was kept current. But if your machine is sitting at 10.6.0, your update will likely be about 790MB; updates to Mac OS X Server are the largest.

Of particular interest in this update is a new way of reporting unexpected conditions like an unexpectedly quit application. As it stood, Mac OS would ask if you wanted to send anonymous information to Apple to aid in bug fixing. Now, it will ask you whether you’d like that information automatically sent to Apple anonymously. I chose not to send the information automatically, because I like to review the log right after an event instead of sifting through Console.

No, I didn’t already have an application quit on me or need to force quit myself. You can enable and disable this new feature directly in Console, located at Macintosh HD/Applications/Utilities. Just fire it up and select Preferences from the Console menu, and the setting is clearly at the bottom of the window.

You can read all about this update and the myriad of problems it addresses here.