dist-upgrade

[John Dangler]

I asked this here about a week ago and got no replies, so I'll ask again
in case someone has some insight...

I have a production web/mail server currently running Breezy that I
would like to upgrade to Dapper.  The 2 workstations I brought up to
Dapper had so many problems using dist-upgrade that I finally performed
a full backup on them and installed Dapper from scratch.

I can't afford to have the server offline for any more time than would
be absolutely necessary, and I don't have direct access to the server
(ssh login).  If I have to install from scratch, it will cost about $150
(USD) for the privilege, since I would have to have the ISP tech center
support install the base system and openssh.

Can someone here give me some insight as to whether it would now be safe
to use dist-upgrade?  

If not, is there a way that I could dual boot breezy and dapper to make
sure that the dapper system is fully working before turning off breezy?