I think my hardware situation is simpler (iGPU). May be why I haven’t had many issues. There is a derivative called Odyssey Linux that makes Void easier. It is very new with a very small community at the moment but I’ve tried it and it makes many things easier.

We have been using Aurora, Bluefin, and Bazzite in our household for about a year and a half and have yet to have an issue on any of them. Aurora is installed on our shared desktop and laptop. Bazzite is installed on a gaming handheld and a gaming PC, and my wife uses Bluefin on her ThinkPad. They are the most issue-free Linux installs I’ve ever had. I just remind everyone to reboot at least monthly. Of there is a security fix, I make sure everyone reboots sooner.

I do run plain Fedora on my laptop because I don’t like being tied to Flatpaks but I do think immutable or atomic is the best for less experienced users.

I have it on an old laptop, running Void, that I use every day for ripping physical media. I play all the ripped CD audio back while I rip the next one. I’m far from a Linux power user and I have zero issues. It’s an old ThinkPad and it kinda just works. Maybe I lucked out hardware wise.

Void isn’t too difficult and is documented well.

I strongly dislike AI but am not a purist. Linux is already a no-go for purists and good luck with the alternatives.

I think the kernel’s policy on AI use is reasonable. As long as a distro or a package isn’t obvious slop and they have a clear policy, I’m okay using it or continuing to use it.

In the meantime, while I mostly use mainstream distros like Fedora and Arch, I’m quite happy that distros like Void exist so that if mainstream Linux ever takes a direction I disagree with, I have alternatives.

In the end, keep perspective. A distribution like Debian allowing for responsible AI use is not the same as the vibe-coded slop that is Omarchy.

My parents have used Macs exclusively for the last 20 years or so because they don’t require much technical knowledge. Before ChromeOS, smartphones, and tablets, they were the closest thing to an internet appliance. Most Mac users I know fall into that category. Heck my dad and older brother were both very capable and knowledgeable with PCs but Macs are so frictionless that they no longer feel like they need to know how it works. It just works.