I'd use a major distro that's been around a while. Avoids having them vanish.

Does it matter? Well, different package system. Some different conventions. Some different defaults. You can make an Arch Linux machine look identical to a Debian machine look identical to a Fedora machine if you want.

Tuxedo OS is Ubuntu LTS with some minor modifications and some drivers from Tuxedo pre-installed. I use a Tuxedo laptop running Debian just fine. You're probably fine with Tuxedo OS if you're happy with it.

What vendor did your neighbor recommend?

I do think getting a Tuxedo is a good choice, if you have the money for it. New users typically struggle either because they need programs that are only available on other OSs or because their hardware doesn't work well with Linux. And getting a dedicated device for it, rules out the latter.

If you do go with Tuxedo OS (or another distribution with KDE Plasma as the desktop environment), then kind of the obvious, best-integrated choices are:

• Digikam for photo-management, and
• Kdenlive for video editing.

You can try these out on Windows or macOS, too.

I guess, it should also be said that you can try out Linux as well, without installing it on a piece of hardware (or making an expensive purchase).
Probably the easiest way is websites like https://distrosea.com/.

Distros are like trying to find the right hat for yourself. At the end of the day, you just need to ~~poop~~ put on a hat and see how it looks.

I recommend something mainstream and kept relatively up to date since you’re trying out both Linux and a number of other open source apps at the same time.

I’d start with Manjaro, Debian, Fedora.

Be sure to try out some different desktop environments: GNOME, KDE, MATE, etc. The desktop environment you use will have a big impact on your overall experience of Linux.

Edit: I’d save pooping on a hat for when you’re comparing Windows versions.

I have a cutting board I made in shop class that is 43 years old.

Younglings.

The keyboard should be twice the size!

And that mouse port is all wrong, it should be 9 pins arranged in 2 layers....

use Bazzite, or any other distro that calls itself "immutable". That's Linux speak for "it just works, and you won't be able to break it even if you try". There are other immutable distros, but Bazzite is the one most likely to have everything you need out of the box.

Also, look at flathub.org and check if the software you need is on there. If it is, then congrats, you're on the easy path. If not, you might need to use the command line to install what you need from another source.

How old am I?

That’s how old I am.

Jk, I'm actually just serial port old.

“How Are Old You” Don’t control the flow of time, sorry

The Tuxedo option sounds reasonable to me. Personally I switched to Linux roughly half a year ago. Dual boot with both Linux Mint and Zorin. Main reason to choose for those, is perceived accessibility and convenience for people new to Linux. Useful website: https://distrochooser.de/

Me:

I recently got a Tuxedo machine, and besides their US keyboard layout being weird (two \ keys, one of which should be part of left shift, and I turned it back that way using keyd), I really like it.

The OS is great because it's (K)Ubuntu but with Snaps disabled by default. Most software I want that wasn't already installed is available on Flathub through the same program (Discover) that can install from the traditional repository.

A lot of the software you'll find on Linux for your requirements are available for Windows too, so you can try them out before you switch, and make sure that they work for you first.

I don't know much about video conferencing, but Libre Office is preinstalled on loads of distros. For photo management, you've got programs like Darktable and RawTherapee that work like Lightroom.

For videos, you can use OpenShot, Shotcut, and KDEnlive. They're all good for the fairly basic tasks that I do, and from what I've read on here, for more advanced stuff too :)

Personally, I would recommend, if you're doing a lot of different things, just switching to a distro that is user friendly and not specialized* like Linux Mint and building up from there. I would hazard a guess that if a program works on a different Linux distro, it's probably gonna work on Mint, especially if it's something bigger like Flowblade, KDENLive, or others since a lot of companies tend to focus on development for Ubuntu ( which is what Mint is based on ) if they make Linux ports of their software.

I don't know the state of the software repositories they use, but if it isn't in there, it's probably gonna be available as a flatpak¹ or appimage² ( and probably be more up to date than the default repository something like Mint will use ) if it's available on Linux. If you went through Tuxedo, the chances of the hardware not working for most modern distro that isn't some obscure, niche distro is low, so I don't think that matters as much.

*Specialized as in a distro making a distro with mainly one thing, like playing games, in mind.

¹ Flatpak and AppImage are kinda universal. For flatpak, to start, I'd recommend going to the flathub website to find what you need if you aren't comfortable with a command terminal. Copy the command they give to install into a terminal and it should do a default installation. Most distros should have it installed and enabled by default at this point.

² AppImages are more like self contained programs containing everything it needs to run and will take up more space for the convenience of not needing to use the terminal to install or run.

A PS/2. No, not the fun thing that plays games, it is just a connecter.

If you just want things to work I would suggest a Debian based distro like Ubuntu Studio. I have heard good things about these immutable systems, but I don't really have much experience with them.

On a side note, keyboards used to have a return key where the enter key is nowadays. It was for a carriage return which went to the new line. It was not for entering data into a field as there was a separate enter key for that.

Laughs in AT

I hate to recommend Ubuntu, because of their locked garden bullshit, but yeah, ubuntu.

I personally use Linux Mint for creative work with an amd gpu and it has been a nightmare, mainly because I need amds proprietary drivers, and they are a buggy mess on mint. Since ubuntu is officially supported, I hope it would work better on there, but I couldn't get ubuntu to boot.

So if you have an amd card, driver support should be taken into account. With nvidia I had a lot less trouble.

TFW I still use PS/2

Photo management can probably be accomplished with GIMP (or even simpler tools, depending upon what you want to actually do). Video is a struggle and a big reason I'm still on windows. Davinci resolve technically works on Linux, but it is fiddly as hell. I got it working on Mint, upgraded Mint and just gave up in frustration a couple hours in to trying to get it to work again.

Check out ubuntu studio - https://ubuntustudio.org/

You can install all the same apps on any distro so in the end it won't matter too much which you choose as long as it's a mainstream one.

Tuxedo is probably great, it is Ubuntu based and EU based. But if you want something different try fedora, that’s what I’m using and having a great time despite being close to tech illiterate.

You should choose a distro where you don't have to do a lot by yourself, since you are new. Another Point is software availability. Since it seems you want to use some specific software, check if its available as a flatpak (in which case the distro doesn't matter as long as the distro supports flatpak), or if it is directly available in the packages of the distro.

For concrete recommendations: as lembot_0004 said, debian and ubuntu are good general purpose starting points, but since ubunti updates some stuff a bit faste than debian and has a 3rd party driver installer, you might want to choose it if you have the need for it (for example if the current debian version does not support your graphics card yet).

I personally use linux mint, which looks more like windows on the desktop than debian or ubuntu.

Other people here have also recommended fedora, so if you want, you can check it out too.

https://endeavouros.com/ is my goto recommendation for a first-time linux user.

I'd also recommend trying it out in a VM first, like VirtualBox.