Others chimed in with advice to reboot the hung Macs, then download the from Apple's Web site, or the even-larger . Most users who tried those alternatives to the much smaller update via Mac OS X's built-in Software Update mechanism said they did the trick.

Some users posting to the support forum remained angry, even after they'd found a workaround.

"I have had my Mac for over a week now and so far haven't been able to do anything much useful beyond backing up data and reinstalling OS, over and over," said "scubasu" Thursday on the same thread. "What a nightmare. It is just the most frustrating upgrading experience I've ever had with an OS...Windows included."