Debian with the Awesome WM. I’m biased because that’s what I use.

Forgot to update…so I was able to get it install with the archinstall script with no issue. Installing it the Arch way, by using the docs, went super well until I went to install the boot loader. I saw no errors when going by all the steps prior to the boot loader install so I’m guessing I was installing grub incorrectly, or maybe something I’m not aware of. I’ll try again soon and respond with the fix, when I get it installed that is, in case you run into the same issue.

I’ll respond when I’m done doing it. I plan on firing up my 15+ year laptop and install it the Arch way for the hell of it.

Just ran out of my local brews, Troegs Field Study IPA, so going to be cracking open some Coors Banquet soon. But I don’t think you will. I use Debian 12 with AwesomeWM and love it.

For me, the systems I’ve installed Mint on for people, haven’t had any problems at this current time. While I have never had an issue using Fedora myself(never been interested enough in OpenSUSE to keep with it when I’ve tried it), I’ll never recommend Fedora in similar cases where I’ve installed Mint. The machines were older and the users aren’t Linux enthusiasts. They just want a working machine to do basic tasks without breaking their bank to get a new machine when their Windows OS reached EOL.

However I can’t confirm or explain why the people you say that are doing this challenge are having problems. I don’t know their hardware specs and I don’t know them so I don’t know what they know about Linux.

(Please note, to all Mint users, I’m not saying Mint is only for non-Linux enthusiasts. I love how Mint is good for the non-enthusiasts and enthusiasts alike).

Debian and Arch, for me, tie as my favorite and honestly can’t say I would want to change anything as I need to use the technology more before I can critique it like that.

Thunderbird

With the options you gave, Fedora. Not really into the AUR. I don’t think it is bad, just not for me.

Xterm

Impressive that Gentoo was your first distro.

I was installing Arch several years ago now and somehow deleted all of the partitions and then all of a sudden I didn’t see any drives or anything on it so I closed it and powered down and assumed it was a paperweight. Years later i decided to see if I could get it running again and I was able to get it running again. I found out that hard shutdowns would have got everything up and going again to them point I could put an OS back on it. So I don’t know which one was dumber, the installation mistake or me thinking the laptop became a paperweight. I lean towards the latter because I’ve had no problems with Arch since.

I’ve become very impressed with LM. I got 2 family members’ laptop going again with that. Nice choice.