Atomic distros have a set-back of having to deal with Package Layering in the case of those that aren’t found on Flathub. That’s a bit outside of the wheelhouse of a non-tech savvy person.

Today’s non-tech savvy persons usually want Chrome, VLC, and Steam. Yes, there are exceptions but I set up Linux PCs for a few people with unsupported Windows versions recently and they are just fine with that because all they do is to access web services from Chrome, playing back the occasional downloaded media file, and some games.

the seemingly endless random named things

When you dig down for a bit, you’ll even find out that Bazzite is merely the gaming flavor of “Universal Blue” and the generic desktop (without gaming stuff installed) is called Aurora.

I am always trying to steer new users away from Cinnamon, which means away from Mint.

I’m not a fan of Ubuntu and its derivates in general (short version of the reason: Ubuntu continues to enshittify, its derivatives fight an increasingly harder battle to apply plasters to fix Ubuntu) and the reality since a few years is that an increasing number of people become familiar with SteamOS, its immutability and Flatpak use, so the old battle ground of .deb vs .rpm, where system config files are stored, etc. has just outlived itself. “A Ubuntu variant is the best because that’s what online tutorials are about” is no longer relevant for the vast majority of people.

Modern Standby is the thing that causes your notebook to heat up when closing the lid and putting it into your backpack.

It only really works on my Surface, on my work’s ThinkPad it merely mostly works, on my private Asus gaming notebook it’s entirely broken.

Old standby on my Steam Deck is what works most reliable in my household.