9.10 isn't a bad version but 10.04 will be better, and will be an LTS
release.

As you know, 10.04 will be released in 10/04, but I'm running the alpha
now and find it quite stable enough for my daily needs. YMMV.

If I were in your place, rather than installing 9.10 I'd wait and
install 10.04 - and I'd stick with the 32 bit version for any desktop
machine unless your desktop is a monster with multiple CPUs and over 4
GB RAM.

I like 64 bit for big servers, but 32 bit is better supported on the
desktop.