Consider taking a look at this criminally underrated Linux-first vendor: NovaCustom. Prices aren’t cheap, unfortunate. But it boasts hardware from about a year ago. Furthermore, NovaCustom takes Libre very seriously: from supporting coreboot to offering blob-free WiFi-cards.

No worries fam. And thanks for clarifying! With that clarification, I think I’ve found what has caused the confusion for me.

Bazzite, even if it’s ultimately derived from Fedora, is actually not closely related to (‘traditional’) Fedora, but instead to Fedora Atomic.

Most of the people that have been recommending Fedora, actually meant the non-Atomic variants. And while this might seem minor, which arguably it is, it is important to be conscious of this distinction.

(‘Traditional’) Fedora behaves a lot like most other distros. Fedora Atomic, instead, introduces a new paradigm. Bazzite goes all-in on this new model and we might even refer to it as next-gen (if you will). Though, it’s important to mention that the next-gen part is only true within the context of Fedora. This is because Fedora has been the only distro to have clearly pronounced their ambitions in this direction. They even reiterated this in their Fedora Strategy 2028 and I quote: “Objective: Immutable variants are the majority of Fedora Linux in use”. (Note that atomic is a rebranding of immutable)

So, within the context of Fedora, even if I don’t see the traditional model being sunset anytime soon, the atomic variants do seem more promising in terms of longevity.

Personally, I’m a huge fan of Fedora Atomic; in particular the uBlue projects, so that includes Bazzite. Therefore, I absolutely welcome you on board for Bazzite. But, it’s important to be aware that Bazzite is not representative of what (‘traditional’) Fedora is (or vice versa); it’s not a “flavor”.

I think your response has so far been the most comprehensive. Thank you so much.

It has been my pleasure :D ! Thank you for reading through all of that 😅.

“Tinkering” in my case is pretty broad. You’re correct when you suppose that I like to mess with UI aesthetics and workflows. The other misc tinkering I more mentioned in case there’s some distros that are unsuited to working with strange or niche programs (such as the media encoding and physical media management stuff I mentioned). It sounds like that’s not really much of a problem though. Anyway what counts as “niche” is very subjective so probably wasn’t that helpful to mention.

Thanks for the clarification!

I have not heard of Bazzite.

Interesting. Its fan base can be rather vocal. Furthermore, it has been enjoying a very healthy amount of media coverage. Digital Foundry dedicated a video on it. And even LTT briefly mentioned it recently.

It kinda looks to be perfect if I end up going with Fedora (It’s the most recommended so far).

I didn’t quite capture the intent of this sentence. My bad. Would you mind elaborating/clarifying/explaining? Apologies if I’m coming across as obtuse 😅.

It seems to be quite new

Correct.

and I don’t want to jump on just for it to be a flash in the pan.

I understand. I absolutely agree with you that e.g. Fedora’s future is more certain than Bazzite. Even if the latter recently reiterated their continued support.

As I understand it though, even if it is, it’s easy enough to change distros.

FWIW, the complete Fedora Atomic ecosystem -that Bazzite is part of- allows changing distros with a single command. The only limitation being that the designated distro has to be part of the ecosystem as well. So, even if Bazzite would implode one day after you’ve switched to it, you could just ‘rebase’ to (say) Fedora Kinoite.

Others have said to not be worried about locking oneself in

Agreed.

and to just jump in and try.

Kinda. It’s more nuanced I think 😅.

Also not a fan of “Gaming Mode” style UI but I guess I can just not use it.

Exactly. Bazzite on desktops/laptops defaults to the DE after logging in. So, as you’ve noted already, you don’t have to use it ;) .

Again, thank you very much for your detailed response.

You doubled down on the kind words. I appreciate it. Thank you for being you!

I, like many I’m sure, am taking Microsoft’s discontinuation of Windows 10 support as an opportunity so switch over to Linux.

Welcome on board!

Does the distro I pick matter?

In short: Yes.

There seems to be a lot of debate around which distro is best

TL;DR: There’s no distro that is best for everyone. Each individual has their own best. You just gotta find what suits you best.

but a lot of the discussion I’ve seen breaks down to what each distro comes packaged with

This is a thing of the past. With the excellent Distrobox, you can install any package from any distro on whatever distro you’re running.

This confuses me as if a distro doesn’t come prepackaged with something can you not just install it?

Even if we would disregard Distrobox, you should be able to install software that’s not packaged. So, you’re intuition is right.

Or is there some advantage to preinstalled packages other than mild convenience? Are some components difficult to integrate into your local environment?

Exactly. Managing software that’s not packaged in any way comes with its own set of jank. So, new users are definitely discouraged. However, as mentioned previously, this whole issue is solved with Distrobox. And if you don’t like CLI, BoxBuddy provides an excellent GUI and more. Again, this is mostly a solved problem.

One of the more salient differences I’ve seen between distros has been what the various companies and teams include aside from installed packages (such as snap and rolling out amazon search as a defult search), and the data they choose to retain/sell. Part of the reason I’m switching is due to Microsoft’s forcing in of unwanted features and advertising. Is the company that owns whatever distro I choose likely to be a problem in the future? Are there particular ones to avoid/ones to keep an eye on?

So, what you’re referring to is mostly a Ubuntu problem. They’ve made a couple of bad decisions in the past. Other than them, this is mostly non-existent.

Some peeps got question marks regarding distros like deepin, but I don’t know if there’s anything conclusive on this.

Lastly, some distros and/or (so-called) desktop environments might collect telemetry to improve themselves. But this is done in a way that suits free and open source software. Thankfully, if you’ve got problems with this, you can always turn it off.

I am the sort of person who does like to tinker with things from time to time but I do also want to use my computer most of the time so I’d like to end up using a mature distro.

So, all distros allow you to tinker. My question is: What is it you’re tinkering with?

• If you just want to have complete control on how your desktop environment behaves without going into (unofficial) extensions or editing text files, then you should at least take a look at the KDE Plasma desktop environment; which is literally found on all distros and very well supported.
• If, instead, your definition of tinkering is more broad or otherwise different than what I suggested, then please feel free to elaborate.

I have identified a few frontrunners in my search but I have seen conflicting information on which of them is “mature” (sufficiently stable so I spend less time fighting my computer than I do using it as well as having a large enough community and resources to help me remedy issues I might come across). Do any of these seem like they wouldn’t fit that bill? The frontrunners are: fedora, kubuntu, mint, pop and tuxedo.

• Fedora is a good pick. Though, I’ve been daily-driving (a) Fedora(-derivative) for almost three years now. So I might be biased :P .
• Regarding Kubuntu, let’s just say that it’s at least a controversial pick; problem being the Ubuntu part of the equation. I’d personally discourage you from going that route, but it’s ultimately your choice.
• Linux Mint is cool. I’d argue it does more hand-holding than Fedora, which is great to have as a beginner.
• Pop!_OS is interesting. It has garnered a great fanbase for a good reason: System76 sells hardware with their software (i.e. Pop!_OS), so they obviously care. However, Pop!_OS has definitely seen better days. It’s currently in limbo; the ambitious COSMIC desktop environment is just around the corner. But how smooth will the transition be? How much longer will Pop!_OS users have to endure with the relative lack of work put to the system they actually daily-drive? A lot of questions, but not a lot of answers. I’d personally discourage this as well.
• Tuxedo OS is similar to Pop!_OS. But where Pop!_OS first went to champion the GNOME desktop environment to later ‘abandon’ it for their own COSMIC. Tuxedo OS, instead, turned their eyes towards KDE Plasma. From what I’ve heard, it’s a good pick. As TUXEDO makes hardware just like System76 does, it’s unsurprising for them to care as well.

Does linux have issues interfacing with multiple monitors?

Unfortunately, I’m not very familiar with multiple monitors. The few times I did need it, which was on Fedora with GNOME, it did work well. I suppose it should be fine.

Does it handle HDR okay?

On KDE Plasma, yes. On GNOME, from what I could gather, it should work starting from GNOME 48. Which is a couple of months away. Though, IIRC, some ‘GNOME-powered’ distros may have tried to support HDR in its experimental stage already. On Cinnamon, what we find on Linux Mint’s flagship distro, AFAIK it’s not great (yet) 😅.

In terms of UI and workflow I really don’t mind putting in some time tinkering with the DE, exploring it and getting it how I like. It seems Plasma KDE might be good for this? Please let me know if this is an incorrect assessment. If it is, does it matter what DE I choose? If so, is there something you could recommend for my use case.

You hit the nail on the coffin. KDE Plasma would probably serve you best, yes. Eventually, you may want to explore Window Managers for how they could further enhance your workflow. But, let’s take it easy :P . One step at a time. Start with KDE Plasma. Get comfortable with Linux and the whole ecosystem. And if it so happens that you’re not satiated with KDE Plasma’s workflow options and you’d like to explore other possibilities, then looking into WMs is definitely a worthwhile endeavor.

I have a Nvidea build (RTX 2080). I have heard this can be an issue with Linux.

Yup. It has been better lately, but thank you for bringing this up.

I also have intermediate experience with linux through university and my job (with servers) as well as tinkering with SteamOS.

Things I use/do on my PC (roughly ordered in terms of priority):

• Gaming including emulation

Have you considered Bazzite?

Photoshop cs6

Out of everything, this could be a slight concern. You could make it work through Wine, and it seems to have decent results. If you’re not opposed to using Photoshop CC 2021, there’s this GitHub repo worth looking at as well.

davinci resolve

This is notoriously difficult to install. Thankfully, the excellent davincibox comes to the rescue. Furthermore, it’s also found in the AUR and nixpkgs. Note that the Nix package manager can be installed on (almost) any distro, though it’s relatively advanced.

Misc “Tinkering” (Handbrake, dvd burners/rippers, Really any weird thing I come across that I want to tinker with)

Assuming this “Tinkering” is the same as the one I asked you to elaborate/clarify before, then I can inform you that most distros handle it pretty well.

Alrighty, I think you’ve clearly demonstrated to have done your research. Thank you for that!

FWIW, assuming that KDE Plasma is your DE of choice (at least for now) for both its (relatively mature) HDR support and tinker-friendliness, then -out of your selected distros- only Fedora and Tuxedo OS remain to be considered.