Update junkies, rejoice, for as faithful viewer Steve Williams informs us, Mac OS X 10.1.3 is finally here! Then again, if you're enough of a Software Update addict to bust out the party hats at news like this, you obviously don't need us telling you about it; you knew it was out roughly three seconds after the software hit Apple's servers last night, because your frequent clicking of the "Update Now" button finally bore fruit. In fact, we're guessing that you're probably really hung over right now following last night's drunken celebratory romp. We'll try to keep it down in here.

For those of you who don't spend every waking moment breathlessly checking to see if Apple has dished out another collection of enhancements and bug fixes, this might actually be news. Unfortunately, by the same token, it also might not constitute a reason to whoop loudly and break out the bubbly; it's just a point release, after all, and therefore it's not likely to make any more of an impression on you than 10.1.1 or 10.1.2 did. If Mac OS X updates were films, 10.1 would be a timeless classic like Citizen Kane, while 10.1.3 would be, say, Keeping The Faith-- entertaining and worth a rental, but relatively unremarkable and ultimately sort of forgettable. (Meanwhile, Windows XP would be Slam Dunk Ernest. 'Nuff said.)

According to Apple, here's what updating to 10.1.3 will get you: support for more third-party CD-R and CD-RW drives; support for more digital cameras; better frame rates with full-screen iTunes Visuals; DVD playback on external monitors for PowerBook G4 owners; a handful of security improvements, like SSL support in Mail; and that ever-nebulous "improved reliability" that we all know so well. So it's a solid update well worth installing just to keep current, and unless you were for some reason expecting spring-loaded folders, a fivefold increase in Finder performance, and a free deluxe pizza with Cheezy Bread™, you're not likely to be disappointed-- especially since the relatively minor issues documented so far at MacFixIt appear to indicate that Apple is past its "Installers of Death" phase.

So update away, if you're so inclined. We like to wait a healthy twenty-four hours just to see if the early adopters do us the favor of discovering any devastating bugs, but we're looking forward to the giddy thrill of clicking through an end-user license agreement, waiting twenty minutes, restarting, and basking in the glow of a new number in Mac OS X's About box-- despite the fact that the only improvement in 10.1.3 that's likely to affect us at all is the better iTunes frame rates. Oooooo. We suppose it's sad that something like this would be the highlight of our week, but heck, Buffy was a rerun last night...