help choosing a Linux distro to switch to from windows 11 gaming pc

[Spart0n]

so let me start with I consider myself fairly computer savvy because I've always been the guy in my friend and family group to answer tech questions and build computers. Also I know how to use Google to answer most of my questions that I don't know off the top of my head.

so now with that out of the way, my current PC specs is a Ryzen 5 5800x, 64gb ram, rtx 2080ti. and my main uses for this PC is to run a Plex server and for gaming with an emphasis on modding (Nexus mods is 2nd home online)
currently or recently playing or just like a bunch

baldurs gate 3, Hogwarts legacy, tes oblivion/Morrowind, Middle Earth shadow of war/Mordor, any assassins creed games, witcher games, mount and blade warband/bannerlord

and pretty much all of those with mods/modding. and before I take the plunge I want to know if I can mod games and use vortex and/or other mod managers for modding on linux

so to bedrock of my question.
I've been toying with popos on and off on a flash drive to see how it is but haven't took the plunge to install it yet since the Linux challenge videos and I've watched a few YT videos about Garuda recently and it has piqued my curiosity for gaming purposes and I was thinking mint as an option. but I am here to ask the experts/veterans of Linux what they think would be my best distro because I am kinda overwhelmed by how many there are...and I do not want to be a distro hopper, I want to just pick one and stick with it. I hop around on too many different ROMs on Android devices and don't want to be that way on my primary desktop PC. But I'm not opposed to trying a distro before I install and setup everything on it.

[CosmicEmotion]

Garuda is the best one. Easy, performant, pretty and customizable. I say give it  a shot. Modding is doable in Linux but definitely cumbersome so keep that in mind.

[MiszS]

My personal experience with garuda wasn't that good, I had to do quite a bit of troubleshooting, and the windows don't rlly look good with that macOS style, but ig you can customize it. On the other hand, I had barely any problems with Linux mint, everything worked out of the box, so its a way better beginner distro imo, especially for Windows users, since the layout is literally the same, and it has nearly all of the windows shortcuts 

[Ultraforce]

One option if your focus is gaming could be to try out Nobara Linux. It's a project done by GloriousEgroll who makes Proton-GE which is designed around just being the version of Linux he and his father would like to use basically set up out of the box. So it has Steam as well as Proton, the browser he uses, discord and a few other apps.

Proton-GE being a project that takes the Proton compatibility layer of Valve and has a mix of features that Valve as a big company can't really be comfortable including such as I believe some codecs as well as including experimental or fixes that haven't yet fully gone through Valve's testing. So for a game on release week Proton-GE will perhaps have the fix whereas the week after release Valve will have had time to fully test it and make it available to everyone else.

[Spart0n]

10 minutes ago, Ultraforce said:

One option if your focus is gaming could be to try out Nobara Linux. It's a project done by GloriousEgroll who makes Proton-GE which is designed around just being the version of Linux he and his father would like to use basically set up out of the box. So it has Steam as well as Proton, the browser he uses, discord and a few other apps.

Proton-GE being a project that takes the Proton compatibility layer of Valve and has a mix of features that Valve as a big company can't really be comfortable including such as I believe some codecs as well as including experimental or fixes that haven't yet fully gone through Valve's testing. So for a game on release week Proton-GE will perhaps have the fix whereas the week after release Valve will have had time to fully test it and make it available to everyone else.

That's actually really cool. So basically a modded version of the Linux that valve ships with the steam deck, so that means I could follow if it's deck verified it would work on this distro basically out of the box?

 

The more I read about this, the more I'm wanting to switch to it and not popos

[Ultraforce]

2 hours ago, Spart0n said:

That's actually really cool. So basically a modded version of the Linux that valve ships with the steam deck, so that means I could follow if it's deck verified it would work on this distro basically out of the box?

 

The more I read about this, the more I'm wanting to switch to it and not popos

Nobara isn't Deck verified and is actually based on a different Linux system than SteamOS, with that being it's based on Fedora as Glorious Egroll(Thomas Crider) is an employee of the company who makes Linux products that utilize and support Fedora. With Nobara being customized to have gaming stuff out of the box.

While Thomas knows some people at Valve, he's not employed by Valve and the distribution is not designed for the specific hardware of the Steam Deck.

However, any sort of semi-modern normal PC including a laptop should work fine.

If you have an Nvidia GPU, it does make sure to include the drivers similar to Pop!_OS though some of the installations happen after the fact rather than be included in the image. The Supported Nvidia Graphics Cards are certain 700 series as well as 900 series and newer.

[Ultraforce]

After double checking they do have a version of Nobara for the Steam Deck.

[10leej]

is it bad that I honestly think you should distrohop a bit to find a distro you want to use rather than get recommended one that you you might find to not like?

 

There's nothing wrong with initially distrohopping, it's pefectly natural, it's only a problem if you keep doing it a year later.

[Alexeygridnev1993]

PopOS is good as you can immediately download the ISO file specifically for Nvidia cards but, honestly, it's not hard on any other distro like Ubuntu or Linux Mint (both allow to install the proprietary Nvidia drivers from the GUI). So, it's totally a matter of personal preference and your past experience.

[Spart0n]

After some more reading (from my understanding popos is backed by a huge company and has a larger userbase if I run into issues, even tho Nobara sounds epic and one of guys keeping it going is a main Linux dev, and that it is more bleeding edge than popos) I think I'll stick with popos and get my bearings and playing some games and figure out modding (especially for bg3 and elder scrolls games) then maybe later try out Nobara.

 

Now if I'm wrong about any of this please tell me, the reddit posts I read some of this from were 8mo-1.5yr old

[Pappy Da Ripper]

I have used PopOS and Nobara both, but it has been a while.

I didn't care for PopOS personally. It just didn't perform the way I thought it should and I don't care for the UI.

Now Nobara I loved. The gaming performance was beyond what I was expecting and streaming didn't affect my game play like it did on PopOS.

With all that being said, I am planning on using Garuda KDE Dr460nized, and I'm wanting to run it as my daily. I have just installed it a few hours ago and played for a few hours and it has blown me away with both its performance and capabilities.

 

But I agree with @10leej, you should hop around and find the one you like the most and works best on your hardware.