I have used many many distros in the past, from Debian to Gentoo, from Ubuntu to Arch, etc. etc.. But I need a system that works and does the job well, hence I'm using Linux Mint for the past few years. Linux Mint XFCE Edition to be precise.
However, always during the end of the Linux Mint support cycle.. I have the issue that it's based on Ubuntu LTS, also known as long term support (instead of the latest release), causing a lot of issues in my daily work.
I just want to use the latest clang format & compiler. Or a newer GCC compiler. And/or other tools I love and use on a daily basis... The problem now I need to add a lot of manual package repos / PPA's to the version I want. Furthermore, it introduce sometimes package conflicts. Do NOT get me started with PHP8 from ondrej + Wine stable from WineHQ.
I do not want an unstable distro like Arch, my time is limited (sorry Arch lovers). I also tried Manjaro. Also broke my system once I think, I do like Manjaro. I like Linux Mint a bit more, except at the end of the support cycle (where we are now at).
That all being said, I think I'm ready for something new... Void Linux! That is right, I think I will move over to Void Linux, created from scratch. Using a rolling release, but focused on stability (we will see). It's therefore also using it's own package manager (XBPS). As well as it's own init system: "runit". Non-free packages might be a bit harder to find, but I mainly use VSCodium, Element (Matrix), Nextcloud, KeePass, Firefox, Telegram, Transmission, Wine (Windows games :P), Mumble, Inkscape and of course various dev tools: npm, go, php, gcc/clang, pip, you name it... I use them all. I think Void Linux will be a good fit. I will keep you posted.
Feel free to leave a comment if you have ideas/feedback or your own story on your distro you're using. Are you planning to distro hop again?
