My Ubuntu 10.4 LiveCD gets stuck on 83% of the installation and I don't have any blank CDs. I was wondering if I could just upgrade from the Update Manager or do I need to install fresh from a new cd? Thanks in advance.

do the checksums of the iso of ubuntu you burned to cd match those on the server?

if they do match , and your CD is clean(without scratches, and try to use the check disc option while booting from it , to see if it is corrupt , and it is not corrupt , then it's unsafe to upgrade to 10.04 . it might be something critical. you don't really have to upgrade..you know..im just saying, use what works best for you

Ubuntu 9.10 (as it says you are using in your profile) will reach end of life in April of this year. So you will need to upgrade to something else before then.
When you boot your Ubuntu 10.04 CD, run the option to check the CD for defects. You may have to hit the space bar to see that option.
You could upgrade to 10.04 using update manager. I always prefer to do clean installs though. This is the best way to avoid problems in my experience.
The choice is yours.
Write back if you need more help.

silvyus_06, thanks for your response. I have installed many (8+) linux distros and have never had any problems. For that reason I have never paid attention to the checksum (I know I should). I will check that.

tommcd, Thanks again! Why is that? will updates for 9.10 no longer be available after april? I willl try that.

well things are moving on for example playstation ps3 came out and suppose it's the same price as ps1 what will you choose? well i'd choose the latest

ps1 =play station 1 ps3= playstation 3

and well vendors are going to make games for the ps3 (because it has newer features) so that's why ubuntu supports every version fro like i don't know 18 months but then they have to leave a old one to concentrate on newer ones..

Keep in mind, if you've got a spare 1 GB flash drive around, you can install from that. I've never used Ubuntu 9.10. Does it have the Startup Disk Creator tool under System > Administration? If it does, try that and create a bootable USB to install 10.04. If it doesn't have that tool, you can install Unetbootin:

Unetbootin is a simple tool to create various Linux distro bootable USB's.

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I believe there is an upgrade path you must take prior to going to 10.4 in this case. Hope your stuff is in a separate /home partition since if you do the install without the correct versions' path you could loose some/all data. Check out the readme files with the upgrades.
Added PS: no upgrade path used could be reason for sticks at 80+ % -- me thunks.

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No, they will not. After April 2011, there will be no security updates for 9.10. Also, the 9.10 repositories will disappear, so you will no longer be able to install programs for 9.10 after April.
The non-LTS versions of Ubuntu are supported for 18 months. The LTS versions are supported for 3 years for the desktop versions. Ubuntu 10.04 is a LTS version.

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The computer I'm typing on has successfully negotiated online upgrades using update manager from version 8.04 (the version that was on it from the factory) to 10.10.

I make sure to back up my home directory and any files from /etc (such as /etc/samba/smb.conf) that I have modified to external media first.

The one time I tried doing an update it broke a bunch of stuff and I ended up doing a fresh install anyway. Not to mention you should be backing up data either way, so I always figure I might as well go with a fresh install instead of worrying about it breaking stuff or generally making things buggy and end up doing twice the work in the end.

The last two times I moved to a new version I had spare hard drive space, so I was able to install the new version on another hard drive while leaving my current working install up until I had the new configured the way I wanted it for everyday use and felt good about it being stable. It also makes it really easy to copy over directories of programs that you use so things are nice and neat just the way you had them before. That's definitely the way to go if you have an extra drive or a free partition.

Thanks to all for your helpful and informative replies. I guess I will enjoy 9.10 for while longer ( I really like it) and then try to go the upgrade path and hope I'm lucky. I have already made backups, so in that respect, I should be ok.