Lots of news on the VUDU front today, starting with the announcement that the grossly overpriced VUDU XL is finally shipping to all three people who forked out for one. Moving on to more important matters, the forthcoming v1.3 software -- which is hitting barely a month after v1.2 was loosed -- will open up the VUDU Vault. Put simply, this feature will "enable consumer to move owned titles from the VUDU hard drive to a secure area on VUDU servers to free up space for additional purchases." As expected, the feature will only be available on "select titles," but hey, we suppose we'll take what we can get. Moving on, VUDU is also announcing the $39 IR receiver kit for both the original STB and the XL, which will "allow for the operation of the service using approved programmable remotes." Lastly, v1.3 will bring about a numerically listed Most Watched overlay as well as improved searching for TV episodes. No word on when the update will start being pushed out, but we'd guess it'll be sooner rather than later.

It was but a mere eight days ago when we suggested that the number one thing that would currently improve the Zune's status would be to get firmware v1.3 out to end users, and thankfully, that day has come. Sure, it's arriving ever-so-slightly behind schedule, but ZuneInsider is reporting that the latest software is finally available for download now, and it sounds like that annoying skipping problem with Zune Marketplace content will be addressed, as well as throwing in "improved device and software reliability" in the "device detection / syncing" departments. Additionally, the FM tuner drain has also been fixed so that it no longer eats away battery life in sleep mode. So while Microsoft still has a ways to go in our estimation in order to seriously compete, here's to taking the first baby step.

[Thanks, Matt]