1. the main difference between distros is the packages you can install and the default configurations you get out of the box. The main recommendation is to use a popular distro (like ubuntu, mint or pop-os) so you can get a good level of support in both documentation and forums/chatrooms. other distros range from different defaults to completely different architecture so it's recommended to look into them until you are more used to linux and you are curious of finding a better fit for your specific need

for the image editing you can try krita. it's usually considered better than gimp in many scenarios and also more user friendly.

Don't install SteamOS, it's not meant for arbitrary hardware. You don't need a special gaming distro. You don't need a bleeding edge distro either for gaming, despite what people may claim, unless you have very new hardware. Literally any stable distro, including say Debian or Ubuntu LTS, allows you play Steam games perfectly fine. In the past, Arch has broken stuff, including games, because it was too bleeding edge. Both "too new" and "too old" can cause issues in practice.

You can run pretty much any popular program on any distro, they usually come with them in fact, albeit sometimes with older versions. If you really care about having the newest Gimp or whatever, you can usually install that via flatpak on any distro. Some caveats apply, sometimes the flatpak version is worse in some way, e.g. annoyingly sandboxed off from the main system, meaning it doesn't have access to certain folders or hardware. I would recommend using the distro packages first, if available, and only try other methods of installing software (like flatpak or manual download/install) if you are having issues with your distro package.

Linux supports all the file systems, any USB drive that works on Windows should work out of the box.

Whether you can copy settings over depends on the program. For some software, the native Linux and Windows version's file formats are compatible, some are not (there are definitely native Linux games where e.g. the savegames are actually incompatible). For native Windows games that you run through translation layers (Wine/Proton), that's not a problem of course. It's sometimes not so easy to find where exactly the relevant folders are actually buried though.

1. almost every steam game works perfectly, fitgirl repacks are easy to install through lutris and every one i've tried works. if you do switch, you might want to look into jc141 on 1337x, they have prepackaged linux games that 100% have worked perfect for me. Foundry and discord work perfectly, i use them multiple times a week on Arch.
2. yep, it should just work
3. yes, thigh highs are mandatory

Have fun with repacks!

There are a few guides and many many people saying "it is easy, I've never had any problems" but all I have had is problems. Hopefully you'll have better luck than I do but getting repacks to work is an utter shit show IMO to the point where I now have my Windows laptop that is kept to run my DJing software is now also my repacks laptop because like fuck I'm going to start paying for games.

Conversely everything I have downloaded and run via steam has worked perfectly.

I'm using Pop OS.

can I just slot stuff like program settings back

There isn't really much software that is A) cross-platform, B) popular enough on Windows that you would have been using it, and C) the best choice for the task on Linux. Maybe Firefox the only one? Firefox profiles actually can be copied over without change, I believe. A torrent client - you'd probably want a new one and configure the destination directory, re-import the torrent files, and re-verify local files. Photoshop would get replaced with Gimp. For software that runs under wine, you can and should copy over stuff like game profiles and savegames - wine creates a "fake" drive_c directory so they'll go into there. You just need to track each of them down in your Windows %APPDATA% directory or wherever it is Windows hides them in before you erase the drive.

Will the external drive need to be formatted in a specific way first?

No. It's easier to let Windows format the backup drive how it wants (NTFS) and let Linux read it later than to teach Windows how to read/write Linux preferred filesystem format. Most Linux distros already come with ntfs driver pre-installed, or it is a single install command away.

1. Most Steam games are playable out of the box nowadays thanks to proton, you should check ProtonDB just in case before buying games though. Not sure about the rest, but I think there are some decent image editing software if you do some research, I usually just use GIMP in the rare occasion I want to edit something more complex than drawing a red circle around something.
2. Most of your files should be ok after you set up the OS and mount your drive correctly. Programs should be installed again from the start though.
3. They just show up on boot, after shutdown they dissappear.

1. using this guide has never failed for repacks

2. more or less what i did, if you really want to be safe then empty the external drive and format it to Btrfs

3. you have to buy the thigh highs

How much more computer stuff do you want to learn? If you want to commit some time, I always recommend debian , it's stable, well supported but not really the easiest, what I mean is: it is easy enough to get going with it, but not so easy that everything will just work out of the box. Otherwise, Mint is great.

Don't do steamos as mentioned already, not worth the hassle. To know whether a game runs well on linux, check out protondb.com.

Also, as a small tip, don't try to avoid the commandline, you don't need to become a shell expert, but basic knowledge will help you a lot with everything.

1. Any reasonably mainstream distro will handle Steam just fine, I use Fedora. I don't do much Fitgirl stuff myself, but apparently managing it through Heroic Games Launcher is relatively simple. Discord irrc works fine, but it's been a hot minute since I've used it and I don't use FVT, but they list Linux install instructions so you should be fine? I personally just use GIMP, it starts up much faster on Linux but I'll admit to being accustomed to the UI. Something like Pinta might be more your speed. You shouldn't install Steam OS, it's only meant for the Steam Deck and has poor hardware support. Bazzite is very gaming focused, based on Fedora and comes with Steam pre-installed so you don't have to faff about with RPMFusion.
2. Should be fine, Linux generally has decent support for NTFS. Programme setting will be a headache with how different apps store stuff, but some (like GIMP) you might be able to get away with.
3. It's either thigh highs or a neckbeard, choose your poison.

I've never wanted for gaming because I'm on Linux. I even played the Oblivion 4 remaster when my biggest problem was a lack of RAM. Even games outside of the steam ecosystem worked with Wine just fine.

I work with all the same file formats as I ever did. An external drive is a perfectly good strategy.

The penguin comes to your door to deliver them. You could try going without but how are you going to debug anything without the socks?

In my experience, switching to Linux takes the time it takes to get your files on an external drive+2 to 3 hours for installation and set up.

1:

• Games through steam kinda just work. ProtonDB as mentioned can help you check for if specific games work, or if there are workarounds that can make them work. Some games might not be "verified" by Steam/Valve, so you need to go into steam settings and turn on "Enable Steam Play for all other titles" to play these, but they will probably still work, valve just haven't looked at them.
• I've played a few games from fitgirl, Vic3 and F:NV as examples, I just put them into lutris and it works great.
• Discord is an electron app, so it will work.
• Image editing is slightly harder, paint.net doesn't work natively, and I don't know through wine. Nor do I know of an equivalent program, as you say GIMP just isn't quite it.

As for distro, I don't have much experience with those that might fit you, so I can't recommend any specifically. But there are differences, is it rolling or does it have releases, is it mutable or imutable, what package manager does it use, which packages are available for it, which packages are installed by default, does it have a diy or more hand-holding mindset. All of these are important and will have an impact on your experience.

2:

• Yes you can just shove data onto an external hard drive. It doesn't have to be formatted in any specific way, Linux has drivers that can read NTFS and FAT.
• If you use the same programs, and they use the same settings format, yes. If not, no... of course.

3:

It does help... you, since AMD is easier, whereas nvidia might need some work (fuck you nvidia )

1. It will probably work out of the box. If it doesn't you can probably find out how to make it work online.

2. Yes, in fact that's what I did when I switched. I'd recommend you figure out which setting matter to you and where they are before you migrate, as game settings and saves (as an example) will change location when you use proton/wine.

3. You do, in fact, have to buy them as part of the migration process. After you take the picture and post it to lemmy you can take them off though

1. Yes, any general purpose distro is fine (I say Tumbleweed OpenSUSE, but Mint, Fedora, etc are good too - don't overthink the choice).
2. Anything will work.
3. Only necessary when you are fixing an old Twinkpad, but it never hurts to be sexy.

But mostly I wanted to add that for a very limited sense of overall experience - more to the point of getting your confidence up & wrap your mind around how ez installing a new modern OS is - you can just live-boot a distro from a USB drive >!(or literally from whether, bcs Linux things)!<. So in a sense "install" it on an external drive (a few GBs & a few clicks in Windows is all it takes) & you can give it a try, even access your Windows drive as is (to triple-check & make sure that paint.exe hentai is still accessible).

An extension of that idea, depending on your situation & mindset, is to buy a new (now main) drive for Linux & leave the Windows one as is for as long as you need your imaginary Windows safety (you can use it as a normal extra drive even before you format it/delete Windows, you can even point Steam to it & don't even have to reinstall the games, tho there are reasons to not do that, but you'll quickly learn a lot too ... also the extra drive space is nice to have + a bit of quick fallback if the OS drive stops working, you don't even need to go buy a new one).