Debian. I've had installations which went trough several major version upgrades, I've worked with 'set and forget' setups where someone originally installed Debian and I get my hands on it 3-5 years later to upgrade it and it just works. Sure, it might not be as fancy as some alternatives and some things may need manual tweaking here and there, but the thing just works and even on rare occasion something breaks you'll still have options to fix it assuming you're comfortable with plain old terminal.

Debian stable. It's been here for 30 years, it's the largest community OS, it'll likely be here in 30 years (or until we destroy ourselves). Any derivative is subject to higher probability of additional issues, stoppage of development in the long run, etc.

If you're extra lazy, Ubuntu LTS with Ubuntu Pro (free) enabled. You could use that for 10 years (or until Canonical cancels it) before you need to upgrade. Ubuntu is the least risky alternative for boring operation since it's used in the enterprise and Canonical is profitable. The risk there is Canonical doing an IPO and Ubuntu going the way of tightening access like Red Hat did.

Fedora Workstation has been really good in my experience. The available software is shockingly up to date and I haven't run into much breakage of any kind in the year or so I've been using it across 2 systems (despite my best efforts every few months when the urge to tinker hits me). I do occasionally run into issues caused by the default SELinux policies, but they're not especially difficult to work around if you're comfortable using the terminal.

I do share your sentiment about the AUR - I definitely miss it at times. That said, Flatpaks and the fact that pre-built RPMs are so commonplace have both softened the blow a lot.

Look. I've been there. I started my Linux journey with Arch based distros, then distrohopped a lot, and finally found the best for me, and what I personally consider the best either for normal users or those that don't want to do any maintenance.

It's the Universal Blue family of distros: Bazzite (gaming / KDE / gnome) Aurora (standard / development / KDE) Bluefin (standard / development / gnome)

Set it and forget about it. It just freaking works. For GUI apps install from the Discover app store (which uses Flatpak), for cli apps use Homebrew (brew install whatever). If you can't find something, open Distrobox (already included) create an Arch container, install whatever you want from the AUR, and use it like you're used to. It works like freaking magic.

If somehow you manage to brick your installation, when you reboot you'll be able to boot to a past snapshot.

You just can't fail with this. It's the best of the best IMHO.

Another Debian suggestion here, including for gaming and even VR. It basically just works.

Wow, what a wall of text. I'm sorry but I'm sure I skimmed some parts.

Look. The bulk of the replies you're going to get will be like "this is my favourite distro and here's how it works for you" not "this is the best distro for your criteria." It's important to understand the deep level of bias you're going to get.

But your cause is a noble one. I use a particular style of distro because it can be trusted to install well, back out well, do both safely, and allow validation at every stage. I think it's a good candidate, and it's already been mentioned as a really great 'set it and forget it' distro.

Good luck.

Bazzite

A few paragraphs would do wonders for the legibility of your post.

Basically every distro is based on either arch or debian (some exceptions). I've been perfectly happy with debian, even as a gamer.

First to answer your main question if I were you I would try NixOS, because it's declarative so it's essentially impossible to break, i.e. if it breaks for whatever reason a fresh reinstall will get you back to exactly where you were.

That being said, I know it's anecdotal but I have been using Arch for (holy crap) 15 years, and I've never experienced an update breaking my system. I find that most of the time people complain about Arch breaking with an update they're either not using Arch (but Manjaro, Endeavor, etc) and rely heavily on AUR which one should specifically not do, much less on Arch derivatives. The AUR is great, but there's a reason those packages are not on the main repos, don't use any system critical stuff from them and you should be golden. Also try to figure out why stuff broke when it did, you'll learn a lot about what you're doing wrong on your setup because most people would have just updated without any issues. Otherwise it really doesn't matter which distro you choose, mangling a distro with manual installations to the point where an upgrade breaks them can be done on most of them, and going for a fully immutable one will be very annoying if you're so interested in poking at the system.

I stopped using Arch a long time ago for this same reason. Either Fedora (or derivatives like Nobara) or an atomic/immutable distro (like Bazzite, Silverblue, Kinoite) is probably the way to go.

I used to feel like Ubuntu was a good option for this, but it no longer is: too often they try to push undesirable changes that need manual tweaking to fix after release upgrades. Debian Stable is generally good for low-maintenance use but doesn't keep up as well with newer hardware or newer updates to video drivers and mesa, which makes it suboptimal for typical gaming use. Debian Testing can be prone to break things in updates (in my experience, worse than Arch does).

I saw another comment recommend Rocky/RHEL, but note that their kernel doesn't support btrfs. Since you mentioned a root snapshot, I expect you probably use it.

I've been distro hopping for years. After each time trying a few distros, I always find myself coming back to Linux Mint (cinnamon desktop environment). It has everything I need, and just works beautifully out of the box. It might not be flashy or have the latest cutting edge features, but it's stable.

I'm currently running the Debian edition of Mint (LMDE), and wishing I was back on standard Mint. Nothing major, but a few minor persistent issues that never happened on Mint.

I did try NixOS (immutable OS), but it didn't seem to have support for all the apps I wanted. I gave up fairly quickly, so you'll probably have more success.

Look, this is the reason people pay RedHat money. Go install Rocky Linux, turn on all the automatic updates and ignore it for the next five years.

On the enthusiast side, NixOS seems to be working fine if you want newer versions of software or larger repos.

I came from Arch to Fedora as well but using Universal Blue's images. In my case, Aurora (KDE), and daughter's Bluefin (Gnome). They update in the background and only install when you reboot. So far, most of the newer software releases such as web browsers or the desktop environment fall within a day or two for being installed which is a nice alternative. The big plus I see on these too is they are immutable so if something installs or breaks, you just boot into the previous version from Grub and go from there.

Additionally, OpenSuse MicroOS has options for whatever environment you are used to such as Gnome or KDE, this is immutable as well. I view all of these as "Set and Forget".

My favorite distros are Gentoo and Debian.

I can say with confidence that Linux Mint is what you're looking for.

Been using Linux almost 30 years, went from Redhat to everything else, and now I'm back on Redhat to stay. Fedora KDE for a nice, boring, up to date, and bulletproof OS.

I came here just for advertising Linux Mint once again. 👍

tldr; look into fedora silverblue maybe ?

i'm trying out Aeon at the moment. it's from the opensuse people.

it auto-updates, it snapshots itself so any failed update will just silently revert, and it does flatpaks or distrobox only.

if you're okay with gnome, try it.

Debian. Solid as a mountain.

Pls format your posts it's so much easier to read

I've been wanting to try out NixOS for this very reason lately (although I don't break my system often). If everything works for me there, I'll switch to it.

One of ublue's offerings are probably best. Immutability is great for resiliency and updates are easily rolled back if something were to go wrong. Bazzite is great for gaming, otherwise checkout Aurora and Bluefin.

You want bazzite, for this usecase, disregard anyone who suggests something that isn't immutable, all of the immutable suggestions are valid, but if it's not immutable, it is huge downgrade for this usecase.

Mint. It's not sexy. But it always just works. Never had an update break anything. I've got an Nvidia card, which ppl said was notorious for not working with Linux, it just works. The installer just reached out and grabbed the appropriate drivers, so easy. Have yet to have a steam game not work.

10/10 would recommend for anyone.

Use distrobox brother, it is really underrated, I use it on my fedora PC so I can have access to the AUR all the time, you could even use Debian with it and have access the the AUR on a 2 year out of date install, seriously, it is really worth the effort of checking out, changed my Linux experience forever.

I put Fedora on a laptop as a whim almost 2 years ago.

My main computers are arch, but. I had an iso handy and hadn't used anything from based in years.

I am surprised at how quickly it gets updates. Gimp was at 3 before arch stable.

Anyways, I just keep updating the laptop and it just keeps working. I have yet to actually do anything for maintenance on it.

I would say fedora silverblue. Have been using it for a while. All updates, app and os, are distributed via app center so reasonably foolproof.

And a benefit is that it has podman out of the box so you can run docker images without fiddling with the terminal.

NIXOS, set and forget. It will not change unless you ask it to. Occasionally things might get renamed, but they set up warnings and don’t deprecate old naming for a long time

Could some of the instability issues you have on arch could come from what you are installing from AUR?

I use AUR for a few things and it is a great resource but the packages are maintained by users and can cause issues.

I update those packages carefully, remove them if I am no longer using them and reconsider which ones i actually need installed in the first place.

While doing this I have only had a handful of issues pop up while updating and usually there is a recent thread describing the issue and how to fix it after a quick search.

I used Fedora, and am now leaving for the exact reason you're leaving Arch (plus IMO bad repos). Switched to openSUSE Tumbleweed a few months ago and am having a much better experience than with Fedora :D; I use the PC for programming, audio recording and mixing, document stuff, etc. (No gaming though).

Nobara is good but does break regularly, FYI... If you're a "power-user" I wouldn't recommend it as a daily driver.

There's also Void Linux, which hasn't ever broken on me due to an update, but is still a lot of work, due to its nature. It's actually quite stable though, and you might enjoy it, since it's quite similar to Arch and has very large repos.

I can't say much about immutable distros, as the only one I've used is bazzite, which was kinda horrible (broke constantly).

Well, I hope that helped. Good luck!

OpenSUSE Leap is the way to go my dude. It's been formulated by pedantic Germans and you can't go wrong with YAST/zypper for package management.

I've been using Linux for more than a decade and distro hopped quite a bit. Mint used to be my happy place, but recently within the last 5 years or so I've been on Arch derivatives. Endeavour was never stable enough for my liking, but Manjaro has been great. I did have to go back to a snapshot once, fairly recently, but that was primary because I fecked it up and not due to an update.

You mentioned that you have tried several Arch-based distros, so I'm not sure if this includes Manjaro.

OpenSuse Leap or even Tumbleweed. After getting the media codecs up and running, and remembering to set you firewall zone to "home", you're pretty golden.

I have Fedora on my work laptop and vanilla Arch on my tinkering laptop.

I think instead of thinking about "set it and forget it", you might want to think about "if shit happens, how fast can I fix it?". That is because stuff break or there are bugs . If you use a very old and LTS distro, you might be comfortable but there might be bugs that do not get fixed until much later. Eg: Debian's kernel used to be able to suspend-then-hibernate, then they jump to one that cannot. So if you want that feature back, you need to wait.... until Debian catches up with mainline's fixes.

So if you only use your computer for web, email, movie. Then any distro will work.

Now, imo there are 2 types of problems in Linux:

1. Boot/GRUB/partition problems: this can happen if you're dual boot, or a config goes wrong. To fix, usually you need to boot a live cd.

Pop OS would be #1 choice just because it has a "Recovery Partition" with live environment. You can reinstall the entire OS while you're on the plane, without wifi or any USB.

Arch would be #2 here, just because the arch iso is so good. It is minimal and has all the tools you need to fix stuff: partitions, wifi..etc. Plus, it boots in tty so it is faster for fixing.

1. Problems with library mismatch: for this you want one with good snapshots built in. So OpenSUSE or if you know how to configure btrfs, maybe Fedora. I would still go Pop OS here, so you can configure btrfs AND get the recovery from point 1) above. Linux Mint would be #2 choice because they have timeshift built in.

So the TLDR for you is: pick Pop OS for the recovery partition. Also, use btrfs. Lastly, configure your disk nicely, i.e. dont do any crazy LVM encryption, just use standard layout so when comes the time to fix, it is easier.

Debian is a good option but I’d actually recommend Fedora. It’s been very stable for me.

I never wanted a hobby, but rather an operating system. I've been using Pop! for over six years. I only had one stretch where I felt like I was chasing annoying bugs and I don't remember it clearly enough to remember how long it lasted.

Fedora. Ubuntu lost the crown.

If you want AUR specifically then you can only use Arch. That's the Arch package manager, and every distro has its own. Fedora has DNF, Debian/Ubuntu has apt...etc

You could try CachyOS, arch based and you can run it with KDE. I use Pop!OS and have been super happy with it

I use Debian with XFCE but I don't game

I've had the same issues with Endeavour, sometimes you get buggy software and need to roll back. I do a full system backup once a week and update once or twice a day (I like updating frequently as it makes it obvious which package broke your system). When I get a bad package I just restore from backup but exclude /home. Then from there I install packages one at a time until I find that bad one and then just ignore it for a while. It really hasn't been too bad. I don't think you'll find anything like the AUR if you start distrohopping. Debian is the king of set it and forget it, but it might be a shock to go back older packages of everything.

Solus OS is pretty stable

I am responding to you as well as n00bs, or the curious, at large. Debian is your answer, or, fedora and suffer gnome. Following is how I do it.

Debian trixie

Above link is the net installer, download it, burn it to a USB nub, boot to it - be connected when you run it. Think about whether you want to allow root (I do, certainly) and how you want your partitions formatted. I use ext4 for my / (root) partition with noatime and discard and XFS for /home with noatime. Ridiculously fast with an nvme drive. Hot damn. I have 32GB of ram so I do not create a SWAP partition. I can suspend just fine.

When you get to package installation and you're presented with desktop environments, whatnot - uncheck everything (arrow, spacebar) except system utilities near the bottom...continue the installation, grub options will probably be: no, yes, and if you are not dual-booting, no. Continue to reboot

after reboot....

You will be in a tty, nothing but black screen and a login prompt, it's cool. Login as root, install sudo and aptitude (apt install sudo aptitude), following, run visudo. Add your uname below root near the bottom. If you're the only one using this machine add like this: <your username> ALL=(ALL:ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL ctrl+x to close, y, then enter. logout.

Log in as your user. I have a script I run now that installs the apps I use on my desktop - I do not use Gnome or KDE or a desktop environment, but, openbox, instead, for a zillion reasons. Productivity, responsiveness and customization to name a few.

Here is the script:

#!/bin/bash
# Check root
[ "$(id -u)" -ne 0 ] && { echo "Must run as root" 1>&2; exit 1; }

# Install packages
echo -e "\e[1mInstalling packages...\e[0m"
[ "$(find /var/cache/apt/pkgcache.bin -mtime 0 2>/dev/null)" ] || apt update  
apt -y install xorg openbox lxpanel thunar thunar-archive-plugin intel-microcode claws-mail polkitd xinit intel-media-va-driver-non-free
apt -y install curl feh bat lsd unclutter numlockx wget whois mesa-utils mesa-va-drivers mpg123 alsa-utils ffmpeg bc jq libnotify-bin mc lshw lsof ncal ncdu inxi psmisc s-tui sed cpufetch dfc sysstat tar unzip zip x11-xserver-utils htop apt-utils at preload pwgen usbutils vnstat xpdf oxygencursors gpicview jpegoptim libimage-exiftool-perl
apt -y install tango-icon-theme keepassxc lxappearance obsession scrot gvfs-backends arandr menu menu-xdg mesa-utils pnmixer bogofilter bleachbit gifsicle
apt -y install geany geany-plugins claws-mail-bogofilter lynx alacritty claws-mail-fancy-plugin claws-mail-pgpmime claws-mail-tools claws-mail-pgpinline claws-mail-vcalendar-plugin
apt -y install rsync xscreensaver gpicview xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra fd-find libxml2-utils starship pulseaudio
apt -y install meld mintstick ips tldr mpv net-tools neverputt gnome-characters mpv gparted bsd-mailx pkexec xclip gsimplecal
apt -y install hwinfo iftop imagemagick acpi lm-sensors python3-pexpect preload pwgen s-tui sensible-utils catfish iotop pithos
apt -y install xdg-user-dirs-gtk xdg-utils xdotool unzip usbutils util-linux vym yelp zenity zip silversearcher-ag galternatives 
apt -y install planner libreoffice libreoffice-gtk3 xfce4-screenshooter smartmontools screenfetch gimp obsidian-icon-theme orage gmrun synaptic yad zim bashtop grc duf

Save it as a file, make it executable (chmod +x) and run as sudo: sudo ./NAME.sh

When it's done you're fabulous. Log in to the emptiness of openbox by issuing: startx at the command line. Right-click and find the menu.

Now, openbox uses 3 files: autostart, menu.xml, and rc.xml and it gets better from there in your terminal with a functional .bashrc, .bash_functions, and .bash_aliases. You will likely edit ~/.profile as well to include any bin directories

# set PATH so it includes user's private bin if it exists
if [ -d "$HOME/bin" ] ; then
    PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"
fi

# set PATH so it includes user's private bin if it exists
if [ -d "$HOME/.local/bin" ] ; then
    PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"
fi

if [ -d "$HOME/.local/share/scripts" ] ; then
    PATH="$HOME/.local/share/scripts:$PATH"
fi

Of course I have tweaked-out files replete with functionality and customizations. This is a set it and forget it desktop that will remain bullet-proof on Debian. Nothing is free, esp functionality you want/demand - it's your box on Linux, you will create it.

I usually install the liquorix kernel, as well, like this, from a terminal, as a regular user:

curl -s 'https://liquorix.net/install-liquorix.sh' | sudo bash

If you do that, reboot after installing. It's a modified kernel for desktop use, makes things a little faster, easier. I have a game that plays smoother after I install it and boot to it.

People ask for easy set-and-forget Linux distributions all the time completely ignoring the fact that the OS they are typically coming from, WIndows, is definitely not. It's a haughty demand, actually, especially when there are a zillion ways to get set-and-forget in Linux.

Now, the above script will install a wicked desktop, but, you must edit ~/.config/openbox/autostart and put what you want started when you login in there; for example, I use the lxpanel, unclutter, numlockx, and some other stuff, following are some of those entries:

sh ~/.fehbg &
unclutter &
numlockx &
lxpanel &
#orage &
pnmixer &
#redshift &
(sleep 4s && ~/bin/fastcompmgr -o 0.4 -r 12 -c -C) &
(sleep 4s && ~/bin/frank) &
(sleep 15s && xscreensaver -no-splash) &

In my ~/.config/openbox/rc.xml file I have some handy keybinds:

<keybind key="A-F2">
   <action name="Execute">
     <command>gmrun</command>
   </action>
 </keybind>
 <keybind key="W-p">
   <action name="Execute">
     <command>planner</command>
   </action>
 </keybind>
 <keybind key="W-e">
   <action name="Execute">
     <command>x-text-editor</command>
   </action>
 </keybind>
 <keybind key="W-f">
   <action name="Execute">
     <command>thunar</command>
   </action>
 </keybind>

IN ~/.config/openbox/menu.xml I have completely customized it and it's fabulous - you don't need an app to do this, just open the file...

Behold, my menu; I get to it by hitting win+z (rc.xml file entry)

Here is my menu entry for scrot, that I rarely use because the functions are bound to keys in rc.xml:

<menu id="scrot" label="Scrot" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/screenie.svg">
      <item label="click and done" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/screensaver.svg">
		<action name="Execute">
		<execute>
		scrot -q 100 '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
		</execute>
		</action>
		</item>
		<item label="delay 5" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/shotwell.svg">
		<action name="Execute">
		<execute>
		scrot -q 100  '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -d 5 -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
		</execute>
		</action>
		</item>
		<item label="Select Area" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/shutter.svg">
		<action name="Execute">
		<execute>
		scrot -q 100  '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -s -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
		</execute>
		</action>
		</item>
		<item label="screen with 20% thumb" icon="/usr/share/icons/Dracula/apps/scalable/silicon-32.svg">
		<action name="Execute">
		<execute>
		scrot -q 100  '%Y-%m-%d_$wx$h_%X.jpg' -t 30 -e 'mv $f ~/scrots/'
		</execute>
		</action>
		</item>
</menu>

That will get you started - there are so may helpful and useless tutorials out there, you will find a good one.

Additionally, I am a terminal user because it's fast and beautiful, esp alacritty and kitty. You may customize each, check this out:

Or, this:

I get that not everybody likes to use the terminal as much as I do but I would be remiss if I neglected to bring it up, for its amazing functionality. The bash functions and aliases I use are handy and fast bring me wicked function, I even type: wc to get a gorgeous weather report.

I left a lot out for you to find. Linux is amazing, as most of us know, but it requires you to work with what is available, or, create it yourself. What is available, however, is amazing and will more than fit your needs. As far as folks complaining about specific apps, please. If blender doesn't do it for that function you need then don't use blender, find another way, or stick to windows and make the best of it. Or, change your expectations.

As far as system snapshots, backing up, stuff like that - there are a zillion ways. I keep it simple and rsync my ~ to a USB nub. Fast and reliable and I'm not adding a bunch of supporting nonsense or overhead to my system. I use firefox and install it with another script:

#! /bin/sh
sudo install -d -m 0755 /etc/apt/keyrings && wget -q https://packages.mozilla.org/apt/repo-signing-key.gpg -O- | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/packages.mozilla.org.asc > /dev/null && echo "deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/packages.mozilla.org.asc] https://packages.mozilla.org/apt mozilla main" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mozilla.list > /dev/null && echo '
Package: *
Pin: origin packages.mozilla.org
Pin-Priority: 1000
' | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/mozilla && sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install firefox

This system can do anything and most of it with keybinds. Most of the apps I use daily can be customized to great affect, as well the desktop. If you want tiling it's easy enough to install cortile or the like and have at it. Put an entry for it in your autostart file.

There is a bit more I do like add this to ~/.profile to autostart from startx: [ "$(tty)" = "/dev/tty1" ] && exec startx

Maybe immutable distros like fedora silverblue ?

I recommend void. It's rock solid, "stable rolling release", no systemd, amazing package manager. The installation is a bit more "advanced", but I guess coming from Arch that should not be a problem for you.

Garuda is about the same.

Arch base, preconfigured for btrfs snapshots on Pacman updates (and they provide a handy garuda-update wrapper to that), many niceties already done for you.

I've used the snapshot feature a couple times and only because the Nvidia drivers botched something horribly and I went back to the same snapshot a couple times.

And I use distrobox (rootless podman FTW) for some crap too. Like that time I needed WebEx at a moment's notice for a call (and they only provide a deb and rpm). Or spur of the moment dev environments when I don't wanna futz around with vscode devcontainers.

But with arch-based stuff, you gotta read the Pacman output. If you don't wanna, definitely reconsider immutable. Next time I can be bothered to reinstall, that's where I'm headed. Heck, you can start a distrobox with Arch and install all the AUR shit you please without a major worry.

Bazzite, I use it as my daily driver, distro box allows using the aur easily, it is really simple to use.

If you can wait a bit for the Rocky 10 release, you'd get a decade of boring rock-solid secure computing.

Try blendOS. It's basically Arch but immutable. And SteamOS also exists.

use fedora. linus torvals uses it

Set it and forget it, eh?

Any distro you like, as long as you stop futzing with it.

Seriously... they're breaking because you change things. Linux machines stay up for years without issue. Stop breaking the install.