Sorry, I was a little light on details but here is the full story:

When I tried to install the latest client it asked me for my password, which i entered, and then nothing happened. I mean nothing, nothing downloaded or installed, and when I restarted it I was back to the 'you have 144 updates' message. I tried this several times.
I eventually decided to sign on as root (dont ask me why, I just did) and this time everything worked, it accepted my root password and started updating, after a while my laptop stopped responding during the open office updates. I killed the application and restarted it and it took up where it left off and completed all the installs, except now when I start it each time I get the message you have 4 updates..

Those updates are:
fglnx - control
kscreensaver-xsavers-extra
linux-restricted-modules-common
xorg-drivers-fglrx

Maybe I was supposed to use my root password in the first instance, I dont know.
I thought everything was OK, but then found that if I try to install programs under my user-name it starts to work but after the "installing' message it then says 'The software is not available on the server' and it will also wont uninstall anything. It says "Uninstall failed'. But under root it will install and uninstall. Except if the program is listed under 'My programs' then it wont uninstall them under root.
I guess I messed it up big time so I think I will just install the 2.0.8 version when I feel upto it.

However I would still like to know if it is possible to get CNR not to update certain programs (without having to say NO to the udpate message and then having to install the ones you want one by one with the update button in the client). I use Opera for webbrowsing and CNR keeps wanting to install Flashplayer 9 which does not work with Opera. I dont want to have to keep uninstalling Flash and resinstalling the old version 7. So being able to blacklist it would be great.

Thanks for your speedy response to my original post.