It seems in a fit of incredibly poor software citizenship, the Smart installer sets a limit on the number of open files – for the entire operating system and all programs running on it. This file handle limit not only prevented my update from running, it caused me to get some fairly vague messages that had me thinking something was corrupted.

Once I deleted the /etc/launchd.conf file that Smart Technologies saw fit to spam onto my computer the update ran smoothly and completed without a hitch.

Bad Smart Technologies, bad

After removing /etc/launchd.conf, restart the computer

Software update should work fine now.