The RTX is gonna give you issues, since the Linux kernel doesn’t handle it natively like all your other hardware, so it’s gotta be a distro with good Nvidia support
From personal experience only distros that ever broke on me after update are Manjaro and Debian sid. I’m not claiming it is not my own fault somehow or my specific hardware problem and it did happen long time ago but if I want rolling distro I would go with something that is specifically made for it. I had good experiences with openSUSE and Arch so I would recommend something of those two. Also staying on Debian stable is not that bad nowadays when you can get newest packages with flatpak.
It works well enough for some very basic apps, but for me personally, Snap has created far more problems than it has solved. With Firefox, for example, it makes it a lot harder to use some extensions, and FileBot is entirely useless without file system access (I mean, that’s the entire point of the program).
I’ve heard Flatpak is better but my experience is somewhat limited. It could hardly be worse, though…
Each snap is mounted as its own filesystem, which is messy for several reasons (try making sense of the output of lsblk on your system). Flatpaks don't do that, though they sandbox in other ways. There really isn't a "Flatpak hell", the worst that can happen is packages that depend on different versions of the same library taking up a lot of storage space, which is a problem with snaps too.
I still prefer to rely on official repos but I do use a few Flatpaks here and there. But one of the main reasons why I don't run Ubuntu is because of Canonical's aggressive pushing of snaps.
Look at non-multi-function “Enterprise” laser printers. They are completely different than the consumer grade garbage.
I recommend an HP LaserJet Enterprise Mxxx printer, color or not, that is listed on the HPLIP All Supported Printer Models page.
You can find lightly used, older model ones on Ebay, sometimes even with a full toner cartridge(s), for much less than new price.
HP is still releasing firmware updates even for many older models, and the firmware is loaded with features (for example, if it is connected to your network, network printing works from Android and Apple phones without requiring any special apps). The firmware does not depend on any remote service.
If you even need them, the Linux drivers are free and open source and packaged in Debian main (for example); your don’t have to install some weird closed source garbage that won’t work in a few years.
People here are recommending Brother, but I don’t think they have free and open source drivers (think “nouveau vs. Nvidia”). Am I incorrect about that? In my experience, this can become a significant problem as software moves forward but the company does not continue to support their Linux binary driver.
There’s not a “best” distro for gaming, it very much depends on what games you play.
If you want to play latest releases, a rolling release is most probably the best option for you, I hear openSUSE Tumbleweed is very good if you don’t like Arch.
If you want less “aggressive” updates but not exactly a stable, you can try Solus, it’s a sort of middle-ground between the 2.
If your games are not the latest ones, a Debian-based distro is a good option, rock-solid, updated enough and without any “extra fluff”.
I personally use Linux MX XFCE and I’m very happy about it.
With Mesa compatible GPUs it’s objectively better to get Mesa updates ASAP and not wait for 6 or so months. The constant feature and performance improvements are especially crucial for gaming.
Flatpak and Snap definitely make installation more simple. The packages come with their own dependencies so you have way less issues with conflicting dependencies. I like them when they are officially supported by the distribution or developer, but I prefer the official installations over supporting a random person making a package (not sure if this is a thing with Flatpak, but with Snaps that was definitely a thing).
Some software really benefits from not begin inside flatpak though, I had to switch back to the deb version of Visual Studio Code as the integrated console didn’t have access to some software outside the package and was also logging weird errors.
I think that is what is pretty cool about them, that you can have both versions with no problems. Also, of course if the flatpak is giving me problems, I just uninstall it and use the package manager or something else.
It certainly has simplified things for me! To get anything so up to date, I would need to use something like Arch or the AUR, which is fine but I find unappealing (using Arch).
On my main PC I use for gaming I run Arch and prefer native packages whenever I can use them. I’m quite happy to have this one computer by a hobby project, and native applications just make more sense on something as up to date as Arch when they’re available. I have started to prefer Flatpak over AUR packages though. The AUR is pretty overrated, in my opinion.
On my laptop and anything else I install Linux on I usually just use LMDE, and I’ll often prefer the Flatpak, just because it’s way more up to date. There are some apps that Mint keeps up to date native versions of, and there are some apps that come preinstalled that I just don’t care about having the latest version of, but for everything else I usually just download the Flatpak.
Fish shell. Out of the box it autocompletes taking into account in which directory you are. It’s like bash Ctrl+r but without actually invoking it before. Really ergonomic.
I want a stable OS, but I want the latest versions of applications (programs) without messing up anything. For me flatpak and snap meet that need, but I prefer flatpak.
It seem that whatever problems Flatpaks may have, due to sandboxing, is truly isolated. I think as a non-power user, I do not have strong opinions about any kind of technology, I just enjoy the magic of things working without effort on my part. I will dive deeper as my needs change, but my needs are kind of simple too.
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