Not finicky and Arch-based don't really go together well.

Just go with Bazzite or something, the exact distribution doesn't matter (as long as it's not Arch). The more important choice is the desktop environment, which is the user experience and looks of the distro. If you're moving from Windows, I assume you'll like KDE Plasma. It's basically Windows 10 but modernized, with a more aesthetic and clean look. (It's also paralyzingly hypercustomizable, so I would recommend using the default settings initially and slowly learning the settings, rather than diving into the settings headfirst the moment you install)

I personally use Kubuntu (Ubuntu with KDE Plasma), but it's slightly more annoying to set up than something like Bazzite

You don't want finicky but want an Arch based distro? Okie dokie.

Bazzite for the past two days has not been as easy as everyone makes of sound, and I say this as a software engineer that works with Linux 5 days a week. Some of the UI choices are just weird and VR support with Nvidia is so horrible I may end up having to dual boot.

Try Bazzite first. It really is the best beginner Linux distro, especially for gaming.

If you decide you want more control, switch to Fedora KDE.

Bazzite and Fedora, in my experience, are the two distros that “just work” best for new users on the widest variety of hardware.

Cachy is fantastic, but I wouldn’t recommend switching to it unless you need even more control and have become very comfortable on the command line. It’s not a distro I would recommend anyone start with.

You will also see Mint recommended often, but I’ve had problems with hardware support — usually on newer builds — and I absolutely hate Cinnamon, its default desktop environment. I would honestly only look at distros that include KDE Plasma out of the box, and Mint does not.

You’re overthinking it. The hardest part is making sure you have a good backup. Get your files backed up, don’t forget about save games and whatnot that might be hiding in random folders. Take a disk image if you know how to do that.

Format the drive. Install an easy to use distro with gui stuff. Mint is great - feels windows-y. Ubuntu works - the drama is real but overblown for someone just starting out with Linux. Fedora desktop is the new Ubuntu. It just works. Gnome is different but many people like it a lot (myself included). It’s not hard to learn. Save the distro hopping and niche distros for later.

Install your nvidia drivers. (Look up Rpm fusion for fedora, mint has directions on their forums).

Install steam. Log in. Buy a game. Install game. See if everything behaves. It probably will. If it doesn’t - spend 15 minutes researching and trying the fix. If you can’t get it to work - just wipe the drive and try another distro. Generally newer distros will “fix” whatever issue you are having.

You can do all of this in an hour or two as a newbie and be playing games from the steam sale.

Just stick with Fedora for your desktop if you want a traditional desktop workflow without having to jump through hoops. Any of the immutable distros have hoops you don't want to mess with as a beginner, and the decades of forum and docs history generally won't have information specific to your immutable distro and how to manage, so stick with the basics and Fedora.

All distros perform the same in general as far as gaming goes. There is negligible if any difference even tuned straight to the kernel, hands down.

The only thing you'll need to figure out is what Desktop Environment you fit better with to start: KDE or Gnome.

Gnome is more like MacOS, and KDE is more like Windows. Both can be used at the same if you really wish, and there is nothing stopping you from altering whatever you install to behave like some other distro trivially.

Fedora is a good starter to figure out what you do and don't like about which bits, and then make more informed decisions after using it for awhile.

Bazzite enjoyer here:

I mean... you are free to have your preferences and opinions and such, but... I've been running Baz on my Deck for nearly a year now, works great?

Like yeah there are some oddities from trying to use it as laptop/pc via docking in more like, dev oriented scenarios, in that you need to / really should make some kind of distrobox type env to directly fuck with dependencies or try to compile something more esoteric, due to being immutable and flatpak oriented... but its generally been awesome?

I dunno, not trying to fanboy, but maybe I could answer some questions or concerns you may have?

I've tried bazzite, nobara and cachyos

Bazzite is fantastic if all you care about is gaming. I have three devices that will do little more than just gaming that have it and it's fantastic for HTPC gaming if you like controllers. (My partner uses it on desktop and finds it fine and never gets in the way of what she wants to do)

I tried nobara on a laptop that i planned to do a little bit of everything on but for some reason i had a difficult time with it. I landed on cachyos because I've had some experience with arch and felt much more comfortable with it.

Just run Mint.

Why Arch? I used it for a few years, but ended up getting tired of it due to random breakage.

I've been on Tumbleweed since, and the breakage is pretty much nonexistent.

Windows 10 EOL is a problem for future me, having just signed up for free extended support.

And I've got CachyOS in my back pocket. Initial experiments have been somewhat positive.

A word of warning: Garuda is kinda cool and allows you to try lots of stuff you would normally have to set up yourself. It is great if you want to experience what Arch is like. That said, it has not exactly been a stable experience for me. You are probably better off just running EndeavourOS or plain Arch (via archinstall) in the long run.

I'm a fedora user, so I would recommend Bazzite/Nobara, but all of these are good (Except Windows 7, it's not officially supported anymore and I'm pretty sure it doesn't even get security updates). I think you can try them before installing thanks to live USB, so you can just see which one you like more.

I use ChimeraOS on my stepson's computer. A few more thing integrated into it for other gaming and I rarely have to touch it. (Thankfully cause that place always needs cleaning)

It's not arch based but it's of the immutable variety.

I daily drive ubuntu cinnamon 24.04LTS. I rarely buy cutting edge hardware and I edit video as well. 4K 60 fps scuba diving footage for those wondering and gaming had been fine for the most part. Mainly standard fixes similar to those on steamos outside of that is been hardware related and minimal.

Arch is Arch-based, btw

I've gone with CachyOS, frankly it just works. Can recommend. You can tinker more if you want to, but there's no need.

I'd second Mint suggested below. I mentioned this on another thread today, but if you're really concerned about being able to play whatever games you want then just dual boot (use a secondary drive for Linux, not a partition) and upgrade to Windows 11 then install O&O shut up as it will allow you to disable all the telemetry and AI bullshit then just search your installed apps/programs for one drive and delete the app.

I use Mint for everything except gaming. It still runs a lot of what I tried with Lutris and a little tweaking, even got a game working where I just dragged the fully installed folder from Windows over to the Linux drive, but I have some things that work better on windows so I just neutered windows and only run that when I want to play something.

I used Garuda, and garuda is cool, seriously the first time user experience is fancy, but it's also a lot and if you need more than basic support you're probably going to be headed over to the Arch community who is going to treat you different because you're not really fully on Arch. You're also definitely going to forcibly learn a lot picking anything arch based as your first Linux distro.

Skipping ahead, of the choices you've listed and for someone new to Linux who just wants an OS to use I'd go for Bazzite.

BazziteDX? -- It's Bazzite but for developers

I went with Fedora 43 KDE Spin on the computer that doesn’t support Windows 11 and Workstation on the one that does. Next weekend I will be converting that one (my main rig) to Fedora KDE Spin as well.

Why not Debian?

I hope you like Indy games cuz that's all that's on there. Not a single thing looks good to me really.