Grr! Don't you ever look at people's signatures??
OK, so you might not need proprietary codecs for watching videos. But if you have a wifi card that needs proprietary firmware to work, then it will be easier to get it working under Mint than under some other distros. I know because I once had a laptop with a broadcom card. Mint had a specific tool for extracting essential firmware for those from the package provided for Windows users.

Now, a point of style. At the bottom of each post that isn't yours, you will find a button marked Quote. Click on it and an input form will appear with the existing text bookended by quote tags. Edit that down to the bit you actually want to quote, then add your reply text. The result is much easier for other people to read than what you have been doing.

GIMP is not linux and linux is not GIMP. I totally agree with you gimp is not a simple tool (like a screwdriver), and actually can be installed on windows too. If you need gimp you need to learn gimp, not a linux distribution. gimp works exactly the same way on linux and windows.

Just saw this... anyway, I'll 'try'. I came from the DOS/Windows world (still have one foot in it as my work place is mostly M$ shop) so used to having a nice start button with easy access to applications. I can add applications to the desktop or to the bar across the bottom. Basically I can get access to my applications as I always did whether Windows or Linux. Short cuts are mostly the same as I am used to (and can be changed). KDE is highly customizable... For photo manipulation, KDE's Gwenview does 99% of what I need in a photo display/editing tool (crop, resize, rotate, etc.). Gimp is installed, but rarely use. Darktable is also available. Not a photo guru at all though. Another nice feature is I can start typing on the desktop and it auto searches for app name... Nice! Auto found my printers... I am a programmer by trade and all the tools I need are available. Thing is, I just feel 'comfortable' with latest iteration of KDE as a DE now. It is really an individual choice. Try and see, if doesn't work for you, move to another (Linux DE choice is NOT force fed like Windoze).

I've always floated between pure Debian and the Ubuntu family of Debian re-spins as they are the Distributions that I'm most at home in however, In recent months I've expanded mu horizons ti include SlackWare and certain SlackWare re-spins.