This is my rule of thumb and process to choose DE and distro:
Find the CPU model and do a google search with it and the word passmark. The passmark page will tell you how fast the cpu is. If it’s between 500 and 1000, use XFce as your desktop environment. If it’s between 1000 and 2500, you can use Cinnamon (Linux Mint). If it’s more, you can use kde/gnome. If it’s less than 500, use LXQT or LXDE.
How much RAM there is in there. These days, you need a minimum of 4GB of browse the internet (the DEs/distros themselves might use less than 1 GB of RAM, but the moment you open a web browser in this day and age, all hell breaks loose with memory usage). For best performance, 8+ GB is better.
Ensure that it has over 16 GB of a drive. At 16 GB (as in some old Chromebooks), only Debian fits these days (with 6 GB free space after installation). Mint and the others prefer over 24 GB (both fedora and all the ubuntu-based ones are too big to fit in 16gb without issues – debian fits).
Using these rules, I’ve converted many laptops and computers for my family here in Greece, installing the most appropriate each time. The least powerful computer was my mom’s old laptop, with 16 GB internal, 2 GB of RAM, 600 passmark points. As long as she’s only opening 1 tab on Chrome (Debian/XFce), she fits in the 2 GB RAM without swapping (most of the time). I use Chrome and not Firefox for these older laptops because Chrome uses LESS memory than Firefox (there’s an additional setting for it in the settings to help the matters more), and its youtube playback speed is much better too. I use firefox on more powerful computers, and it’s my default too, just not for underpowered computers.
I actually agree with Linux Mint’s decision. You can not trust any random upload. Either it’s an official/verified upload, or it shouldn’t be there at all (or it should be a separate app for those who want it). That’s why in my system, I only install from the official debian repos and not the community ones. I just don’t trust random anonymous uploaders.
As someone who lives in Greece, 10 minutes from the beach, I actually agree with you. I never liked the Greek heat. I like the sea when there’s not many people in it though.
Many times you need to use the terminal with Win and Mac too. Sometimes something goes wrong, or you need to enable something that doesn’t have a UI. So in the last few years, I’ve used the terminal with these OSes too. So I don’t see why you wouldn’t use the terminal with Linux too.
The only time you wouldn’t use the terminal at all, is if someone else is your sysadmin, and you’re just driving a browser or a couple of apps, as a plain user. Then sure, you’ll never need to touch the terminal. My mom only uses a browser for example on her linux laptop. It’s good enough for her. But when there’s an update or anything else such, I’m the one dealing with it.
Get a second ssd, I’m sure your PC has a placeholder for it. Normally, I’d say that you simply resize your main / partition using gparted, however, because it’s encrypted this might be dicey. Hence, get a second SSD.
Υou can download the Windows iso, burn it in a usb stick before you nuke it to install linux, and find free legal serial numbers online (there are various serials for all versions of win10/11, all legal – it’s considered semi-activated with these).
Debian is the best for your needs, because that’s what Google uses internally too (they used to use ubuntu, but a few years ago they moved to a slightly modified version of Debian-Testing). All its engineers are using Debian-Testing at their desktops, so it’s the best tested and tried distro for Android. Although all other distros are also expected to work fine.
A supported, older Pixel will have the best support for to install alternative Android distros. But to alternative OSes in general (not just android), it gets a bit more complicated and you need to check if the pixels are supported by all or not.
I use XSane and TheGimp to scan and edit my paintings, Firefox with privacy extensions to browse, VLC to play videos, Gnome Mahjongg to waste time playing. I used to use Resolve to edit videos, I’ll soon start using Kdenlive. As a visual artist I have a thing for film emulation that Kdenlive can’t do, but it’s something I’ll have to leave behind.