I’m over tinkering with my OS. So I’m looking for a distro that “just works” out of the box for my laptop. Also I want to test an “easy” distro I can install for my grandpa.
I don’t care for immutability, declarative config, being fully FOSS or having the newest stuff. I don’t want snaps, or a software center that relies on them. So no Ubuntu.

What I do want (ideally out of the box):
Important:

  • as few annoying visible bugs and crashes as possible (looking at you, Ubuntu)
  • Wayland support
  • good package selection, so no independent fringe distro
  • fluid YouTube videos, streaming, pre-installed codecs

Less important:

  • ideally with Gnome
  • encrypting the hard drive from within the GUI installer
  • nice font rendering (used to be a problem, but I guess not anymore)
  • installing Steam with a button press
  • pre-installed sane-airprint and sane-airscan (automatic setup of my networked printer-scanner-combo)

You get the idea. The usual stuff (low-end gaming, browsing, streaming, printing, scanning) should just work. I don’t have any hardware that poses a problem.
From what I’ve read, Mint doesn’t yet support Wayland and doesn’t ship with video codecs anymore. (Or am I wrong?)
What are the other options? Is Zorin king of the block now? Is Manjaro good now?

Thanks for any and all input.

  • KISSmyOSFeddit@lemmy.worldOP
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    6 months ago

    I don’t have personal experience with them, but I keep hearing they’re very slow to start.
    And I dislike them on principle, because Canonical tries to push snaps as the main distro-agnostic way of installing software, but they are hard-coded to only work with Canonical’s servers. It reminds me of the embrace-extend-extinguish strategy of Microsoft.

    • GravitySpoiled@lemmy.ml
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      6 months ago

      Snaps aren’t that slow anymore. They closed the gap a couple of months ago. (I still dislike snaps and ubuntu for pushing them)