Linux

Fedora Silverblue (atomic GNOME) and Kinoite (atomic KDE) have been solid for both work and gaming. System maintenance is largely seamless and automatic once configured. I still use Arch daily, but only in the terminal (distrobox and containers).

Going AMD is so worth it too, I have zero regrets swapping my RTX 2080s for RX 6800 XTs. Secure boot, Wayland, no fuss updates. Couldn't be happier.

You mentioned needing customization...not sure what you're hoping for there, but the atomic distros allow for plenty of userspace tweaks. It's the system-level stuff, like boot and greeter themes, that require a bit more work to implement. My time is too precious to fuss about that stuff these days.

I don't have anywhere near your experience, but the key points (customizable, no bloat, good wiki) all scream Arch, as you predicted 🙂

I just installed NixOS and the repeatability of it is pretty neat. I like the idea of having one file that sets up 90% of any pc going forward. Not sure how often I'll use it, but feels neat.

If you are an expert, why are you asking pee ons like us?

Anything arch based. :)

I've bounced around alot, have numerous distributions on my Proxmox Hypervisor, but my favorite daily driver, for a really old computer, is ( MX Linux ) I've twice tried other distros to see if I could improve upon the stability and performance, as well as the very convenient availability of a feature rich KDE Desktop environment, and I came back to MX twice now. When I get a new fast computer, I'll switch to Qubes OS, for it's built-in hypervisor and security/privacy and isolation features, but until then, I'll stick with MX.

IMHO, there are excellent reasons why MX ranks highest. I think it's original roots in AntiX with the elimination of systemd has afforded it a substantial advantage over stock-standard Debian, my last daily driver which always had performance issues. With MX, on same hardware, system lock ups are far less frequent when the system is overtaxed.

I use Debian stable because I'm tired of constantly twiddling with breaking stuff, I just want a distro that keeps working without issues and tinkering.

If you still want to learn Linux stuff and debug packages, then go for a bleeding edge distro.

I run ubuntu's server base headless install with a self-curated minimal set of gui packages on top of that (X11, awesome, pulse, thunar) but there's no reason you couldn't install kde with wayland. Building the system yourself gets you really far in the anti-bloatware dept, and the breadth of wiki/google/gpt based around Debian/Ubuntu means you can figure just about any issues out. I do this on a ~$200 eBay random old Dell + a 3050 6gb (slot power only).

For lighter gaming I'll use the Ubuntu PC directly, but for anything heavier I have a win11 PC in the basement that has no other task than to pipe steam over sunshine/moonlight

It is the best of both worlds.

Personally, I find Debian pretty good these days. I used to default to Testing, but I've gravitated towards stable.

Honestly, in the age of Flatpak and Steam, almost any distro works.

EndeavourOS, Simply Arch with an installer, has KDE as an option for DE.

I use it, I love it. Arch is great. E-OS just cuts out the first few hours/days of set up.

Look into:

• Bazzite (Fedora Atomic)
• Nobara (Fedora)
• ChimeraOS (Arch, AMD-only)
• Garuda (Arch)

All are preconfigured for gaming. Bazzite and Nobara use the fsync kernel, not sure what Chimera uses, and Garuda uses the zen kernel.

Otherwise, Arch is still the most popular choice for gaming if you look at the statistics.

Check out Garuda Linux. Comes with a preset catalog of gamer related nonsense on KDE - or - they offer a minimal KDE version as well if you'd rather set things up your way.

I started with the preset one and then switched my machines over to the barebones one once I had a handle on Linux. It's been a smooth ride. Things only break when I break them touching things unnecessarily out of curiosity because I don't know what I'm doing.

Garuda is arch btw

Arch w/ KDE gamer here. I have generally had a good experience with it. I think everything you said is generally accurate. In terms of customization, lack of bloat, and a good wiki, Arch is generally considered to be all of those things. A rolling distro like Arch I believe will also be getting the latest proton updates, which may help with sooner game compatibility/optimization updates on more recent releases.

I say go for it.

I game on arch (btw) But honestly I don't think the distro itself really matters for gaming? Just choose the one you want and give er

I always come back to OpenSuse Tumbleweed. Once I have everything setup, it's stable as a rock and kde works really well on it.