I'd like to start by thanking everybody who responded to my questions. Your answers have helped a lot when it came to my worries on switching to Linux.
I've taken in a lot of your recommendations:
Fedora, Fedora Kinoite, Nobara, Bazzite Linux, VanillaOS,
I've decided on Fedora Kinoite, as it has everything I want from a distro.
It was very kind of you all to answer my questions but after making that post and reading your answers new questions propped up.
These questions are a little more opinionated than the last ones, and a little better thought out, but please take some time to answer them.
Questions:
Is Wayland worth using? Especially when you consider all the issues that may come from using an NVIDIA card.
Are there any real noticeable advantages/improvements to using Wayland over Xorg.
Does bloat actually matter or is it just a meme?
Does bloat actually have a noticeable negative impact on your system or are people just over reacting/joking.
What are some habits I should practice in order to keep my system organized and manageable?
Any habits or standards that I should abide by in order to save myself headaches in the future?
Any other resources besides the Arch Wiki that I should be aware of?
Self explanatory.
What do you wish you knew when you first started using Linux that would have saved you a headache in the future?
I'm not referring to some skill but instead something pertaining to Linux itself. Feel free to skip this question.
I'll be going to sleep soon, so apologies if I don't reply but please take a moment answer any questions you think you can.
Wayland is the new standard and X11 is the old standard. NVIDIA support is getting better. The advantages are mainly under the hood, the most relevant for most users is in security and compatibility with newer hardware. If your distro comes with Wayland, use it. If it doesn’t, then don’t worry about it.
Bloat’s subjective and mostly a matter of taste. Unless you’re trying to squeeze every bit of performance out of a 10 year old potato, the bloatiness of your default desktop install will not meaningfully impact your performance. Even the most bloated linux install runs lighter than Windows 10.
Keep up to date, especially security updates. Don’t work in root unless you have to, don’t use sudo if you don’t need it, and configure permissions properly rather than 777ing everything. Be careful adding package repositories: don’t add from other distros or other versions of your distro as that can screw up dependencies. Check your package manager or flatpak before resorting downloading random files and trying to install them manually.
Yes: linux subreddits/communities, Fedora’s own documentation and forums
How easy it is to make a mistake that’s very hard to fix. Also, understanding what “everything is a file,” the filesystem in general, and what a desktop environment even is.