PC Gaming

There's not really a difference, steam packages it's own libraries

I went to PopOS after finding Nvidia driver management to be an absolute nightmare in other distros. If you have an Nvidia card I'd start there.

You probably won't notice performance differences between distros. It's likely a few percent at most. You can generally install all the same apps and tools.

If you're new to Linux, pick based on the update schedule and desktop environment.

For updates you have periodic vs rolling release. Debian-based distros (Ubuntu, Mint, Fedora) tend to be periodic and give good stability if you're using your PC for more than gaming. Arch-based distros (Endeavour, Garuda) tend to be more cutting edge if you're solely focused on games.

For DEs it basically comes down to KDE If you prefer Windows or Gnome if you're used to Mac. Though Cinnamon and XFCE are great lighter alternatives, and similar enough to classic Windows.

Mint with Cinnamon is a great starting point, and should be stable and comfortable. I'm personally switching to EndeavourOS with KDE mostly for its closeness to SteamOS.

If in doubt, grab a portable HDD, install Ventoy, and drop some live images on there to try the distros yourself.

Garuda makes it easier, and by easier i mean steam and everything you need to run it comes out of the box so you don’t need to download the one or two things. That said, it was like 5 minutes and no effort to get steam on kubuntu. Garuda does have the consequences of its very different from windows and isn’t as stable as many other beginner friendly distros

Yeah you'll want to make sure you have the latest proprietary Nvidia drivers. The open source ones work but don't give the best gaming performance (not for a lack of community effort, from what I understand).

Here's the official basic guide for Mint:
https://linuxmint-installation-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/

And here's the official basic guide for Pop!:
https://support.system76.com/articles/install-pop/

The main thing is to make a USB that you can boot from, so you can test things out before committing.

Linux hasn't really been complicated for a number of years, as long as you use something like Pop! or Linux Mint, running games through steam is painless.

...and as long as you are not doing VR, the games you play don't run weird anti-cheat software that'll ban you, you don't need windows/mac-only software for work or a hobby, you're not operating niche hardware.

This will depend on the Linux distro, some of the installers make it very clear which drive the bootloader will go to, and others won't - more so in the case of BIOS/MBR based systems.

Systems that use UEFI should only have a bootloader where the /boot partition (which should have the partition type "ESP", generally labeled in the installer) - however during the installation of this it may modify your PC's boot order to try to boot from this first. Both legacy BIOS and UEFI systems should have a way to change the boot priority however, so that this won't be a problem.

Sadly it's a bit hard to be specific since every distro's installer is different, and I haven't used Linux Mint in 8+ years to know what their installer's behavior is.