10.6.4 update issues - fixed, sharing the steps

Question

Installation of the 10.6.4 Combo update was failing. Logs reflected the following:
+6/20/10 8:28:02 PM installd[1814] PackageKit: Install Failed: PKG: extracting "com.apple.pkg.update.os.10.6.4.combo"+
+Error Domain=PKInstallErrorDomain Code=110 UserInfo=0x102f12670 "An error occurred while extracting files from the package “MacOSXUpdCombo10.6.4.pkg”." Underlying Error=(Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=23 UserInfo=0x105a81e60 "*The operation couldn’t be completed. Too many open files in system*") {+
+NSFilePath = "/var/folders/zz/zzzivhrRnAmviuee++++++++++/-Tmp-/PKInstallSandbox-tmp/Root";
+NSLocalizedDescription = "An error occurred while extracting files from the package \U201cMacOSXUpdCombo10.6.4.pkg\U201d.";+
+NSURL = "#MacOSXUpdCombo10.6.4.pkg -- file://localhost/Volumes/Mac%20OS%20X%2010.6.4%20Update%20Combo/MacOSXUpdCombo10 .6.4.pkg";+
+NSUnderlyingError = "Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=23 UserInfo=0x105a81e60 \"The operation couldn\U2019t be completed. Too many open files in system\"";+
+PKInstallPackageIdentifier = "com.apple.pkg.update.os.10.6.4.combo";+
With a sprinkling of kernel messages nearby:
+6/20/10 8:27:56 PM kernel file: table is full+
Problem is pretty straightforward--too many files open. Google suggests it's a soft limit set by the kernel. Default looks to be 2,000 files.
I ran the following in Terminal to temporarily set the soft limit to 10,000 files:
*sudo sysctl -w kern.maxfiles=10000*
*sudo sysctl -w kern.maxfilesperproc=10000*
(Note: These changes revert after a reboot.)
Reran the update and it installed without issue.
Hope this helps.

Answer 1

It looks like nicboman found the smoking gun, at least for those with the SMART product drivers:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=11712221#11712221
For anyone else with a similar "installer encountered an error that caused the installation to fail. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance" message but without this software installed, it might be worth entering the following simple Terminal command & pressing return to see if something else has set the kern.maxfiles parameter to too small a value:
sysctl kern.maxfiles
This is informational only; it does not set anything or require sudo to execute. I believe the normal response should be:
kern.maxfiles: 12288
If it is anything less, especially if it is a much smaller number, this is almost certainly the cause of the failure.