Comment 1682 for bug 1

Hi :)
A fresh install is always better than upgrading.  Also the more steps you take the less likely to be satisfactory.  It's usually possible to upgrade from 1 LTS to the next LTS without upgrading to all the intermediarry 6monthlies.

There is a neat trick for installing any version over any other version (so you can even go backwards too! 12.04 to 10.04 or whatever).

Step 1 is to use a LiveCd session or similar but when you get to the partitioning section choose "Manual" or "Advanced" or "Something else" depending on which version of Ubuntu you are installing.  It's always the bottom option.  It rescans your drives and lets you choose which partition to use as what.  The trick is the crucial part here.  DO NOT let it format any partition except for the Swap.  So, make sure there are NO ticks in the "Format?" column.

Step 2 = after the install is complete.  Work out which programs you had installed (or at least those you want) that are not currently installed.  A quick look in /home/username at all the .somethings (eg .libreoffice or .config/libreoffice indicates that you have LibreOffice).  There are some sub-folders such as .gconf and .mozilla but you only need a hasty skim through, and compare with whatever is (or rather is not) in the menus.

It's unclear what people mean by "broken" or "unstable" unless you know the person.  One chap (granted he was an office worker) told me his machine was "completely dead" and spent about a week ranting about how bad it all was and how useless tech support was he finally let me onto his machine and i solved it in 3 clicks.

So, if you say something is broken or unstable then it's better to give a hint as to what sort of things are going wrong.  Otherwise many techies just assume you're an idiot and the instability is user-error because that's what it so often turns out to be.
Regards from
Tom )