I would recommend Trisquel. It’s 100% free, recommended by FSF, based on Ubuntu, MATE environment, but there is also a KDE version, everything works okay.

You summarize it quite well. But I would still recommend Arch (but as an Arch user since 2008 I am biased on this). Why?

• Lightweight, ideal for gaming. My full-featured Wayland-setup with labwc runs with ca. 2 gigabytes of RAM, including Firefox, which on it’s own currently takes up 800 megabytes. Not that RAM would be an actual issue on modern gaming setups, but still, this shows how little resources the system needs for itself.
• Gaming on Linux is pretty much solved nowadays thanks to Valve (Steam, Proton, etc.) and Flatpaks. Games that do not work are intentionally made to not work on other platforms than Windows due the games using ring0 spyware as DRM and for anti-cheat.
• Privacy by concept – while there are no specific measures taken regarding privacy, the default installation just does nothing except initializing the hardware and allowing the user to sign in. Everything else is up to you.
• Software development is – like gaming – a no-brainer. All common tools work on Linux. Even more: Dependency handling, setting up the environment, using different compilers – all this feels much smoother than on Windows.
• Maintainability is great. Since there are no package changes from upstream, you can be sure that bugs are typically bugs in the software and not coming from Arch packaging.Thanks to rolling release you get much less updates at the same time compared to fixed release distribution – ganted you update regularly. I check the news and update every 1-2 weeks at the weekend.

And since you’re coming from Windows, you have to learn new stuff anyways. So why not dive head first into Arch?

It all comes down to how “techie,” you are. If you want something safe, than Debian is fine. All you have to do is not use Debian Stable and use Debian Sid. There are also many other Debian based distros that are excellent for new comers. Many are likely to recommend you Mint, which is a fine distro for people how are new to Linux.

OpenSUSE is pretty good if you are into rolling releases. Fedora is excellent if you want to be building your own apps from source and know how to use the proper flags when building. However, if you want something that is a bit faster and simpler to use, then I would suggest something else.

If you want something independent and you say that you know your way around computers then either Arch or something Arch based, so you are not going full on KISS. In the end, it all comes down to how much of a DIY system do you want and much of a system you want to just work. Do you wan it be rock solid or with a higher chance of breakage.

Personally if you want to go pure, then go Debian Sid, it is a good mix of rock solid along with some newer packages and it is way more stable --statically speaking, or sort of-- than Ach. Again, this is anecdotal as you will have a number of people say that they had been on Arch for a while without any issues. So, people’s mileage may carry.

On one of my old machines, I have been testing Q4OS and Mabox, which are Debian based and Arch based respectably and they have been border line perfect for years. Q4OS uses KDE out of the box. Mabox uses Openbox, so it might not be something you are looking for. Both are very light on resources which you can use for running all the apps you want.

However if you have copious amounts of RAM and you want something a little more known, then check out Mint, or NixOS. The latter requires a bit of a learning curve but if you already work with computers, and have no issue reading documentation then you won’t find it difficult.

Seems like you answered your own question. If a gaming software engineering privacy enthusiast isn’t a power user, I don’t know what is.

Also, Tumblweed really isn’t intimidating. Give it a try.

You sound like a perfect fit for Arch.

If arch seems interesting to you, you can ease setup using arch-install, and you have access to its magnificent wiki and aur that arch provides.

Otherwise fedora is pretty much on bleeding edge and has all the niceties too

Also Slackware current if you want kiss but without dependency resolution and stuff.

How about CachyOS?

I like to live on the edge of time and therefore have the feeling that debian based distros (although being very stable) are too “old” for my liking.

Nowadays, with Flatpaks, so many software providing binaries, etc. this does not matter so much. If you want, you can even use something like Distrobox to have containers for tools using whatever bleeding edge distro you want, but still have a solid stable underpinning.

Debian also has more stuff than you would expect in backports. The main sticking point is yes, you’ll be stuck in Debian 12’s KDE until 13 comes out. But that might be sufficient for you?

(You could also use Debian Testing, which is basically a rolling release. But I’d consider stable first.)

Remember that you can always have current versions of programs by using flatpak and appimage on Debian.

I’m currently on Fedora because my hardware was not supported yet by Debian when I got it. I’ve had a lot more problems with Fedora than Debian though and intend to go back to Debian when 13 comes out and use flatpak for the applications that I really want to be at their current version.

I have similar values to yours re community and privacy.

Ubuntu/Canonical gets flak for telemetry & Snap packages, despite PrivacyTools.io recommending it. Criticism stems from perceived compromises on privacy & a “walled garden” feel, despite being a better option than Windows/macOS. It’s just a clash between open-source ideals & pragmatic realities.

I’m not very knowledgeable about or experienced with Linux yet, but from everything that I’ve read, I have the impression that Arch is the one that’s oriented to power users, not OpenSUSE. I’ve seen OpenSUSE suggested as one of the more beginner-friendly distros, apparently one of the, if not the most stable rolling release distros, and supposedly has one of the best KDE integrations. That’s the one I’m leaning towards adopting as my first Linux distro to really use seriously to replace Windows on desktop (as opposed to just playing around with it). I am also considering the other flavors of OpenSUSE besides Tumbleweed: Slowroll and Leap, in that order.

I agree with your feeling that going with one of the source distros that other distros use as a base is a better bet, and have seen some reviewers say as much. As far as I know, the big 4 in that regard are Arch, Debian, Fedora, and OpenSUSE. Most everything else is apparently either a derivative of one of those or a niche independent distro.

This mentality that “Corporate backed stuff is bad” should be thrown out of the window. Alot of evil corporations have contributed to make Linux better for everyone.

Regardless, have you tried Debian Stable with Backports?

Have you looked at Linux Mint or other Ubuntu derivatives that have programs compatible with Ubuntu without all the scuff Ubuntu is known to do bad

Again, are you sure affiliations with IBM and Redhat makes Fedora worse? Can you justify this statement?

I’ve pretty much run every distro under the sun. From arch to Gentoo to Debian and all of the middle ones. I then landed on endeavour OS and used it for around 3 years. It was great until it broke.

Every couple of months something breaks and I can never fix it. Nothing fixes it, even a timeshift restore. I just had to reinstall, and that was painful. I’ve then set out on a new hunt.

I’m now experimenting with Nobara OS as it is a better Fedora and comes with some goodies for gaming. It’s been ok so far besides this occasional random freezing that I can’t figure out. It goes away by either rebooting or switching to a tty and back to GUI. I’m still experimenting with it. If it works well, I’ll keep it, if not, my next experiment will be BazziteOS. I did try mint for a little bit, too, and liked it, but I wanted to explore more.

I was about to suggest Debian and Gnome. 😂

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