Heads up, "early adopters"-- the word around the water cooler is that Apple's gearing up for yet another installment in its popular series of Mac OS X updates, and that said update may broadcast sometime today. According to Think Secret, if the update indeed decides to drop by, its name tag will likely read "Mac OS X 10.0.5" (10.0.4 is missing, presumed superseded) and should be relatively minor in nature: there's talk of further speed improvements, and a slim possibility of DVD movie playback, though we're not holding our collective breath. Put your Software Update panels on red alert and keep watching the skies.

We should mention, however, that we've spent the past week booted into Mac OS 9 instead. Why this heretical act? Well, simply put, just for this past week, we found ourselves needing to do things that are currently not possible in Mac OS X. Want to watch the DVDs of the cancelled Clerks animated series on the plane? You need Mac OS 9. Want to play the 1996-era version of Monopoly? Again, Mac OS 9. Want to digitize audio from an external source and edit the raw waveforms? You guessed it-- Number 9, number 9, number 9. And most importantly of all-- want to play the Playstation version of Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 via Connectix Virtual Game Station? Hey, how do you say "no" in German? "NEIN!!"

What this illustrates to us is that Mac OS X still has a ways to go before it's truly ready for prime time. Still, as the Update Train just keeps chugging along, the OS is getting closer and closer to where it needs to be. Eventually (maybe even today?) we'll be able to watch DVDs without booting back into 9. Audio support can only get better, because it can't get much worse. And while we're probably never going to be able to play Playstation games under Mac OS X, at least a Carbon version of Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 is almost out. In the meantime, we'll just keep making regular visits to the Startup Disk control panel...