I agree with mg above.

Debian stable for its long life, solidity and the largest quantity of readily available software packages for a distro.

The choice of desktops is not to be sneezed at either, making it eminently suitable for a variety of computers (old, new, large, small).

I'd vote Void, but Void was not asked.

I've recently become enamored with Solus Budgie, especially for users new to Linux. And if it matters to you, it has quickly climbed the charts on the Distrowatch site. Solus is a rolling distro, meaning once installed, you should never have to reinstall it. The Solus Software Center is impressive in my opinion in regards to Linux newbs. I was even able to install it on a Macbook Pro (mid 2009) with few issues. I was pleasantly surprised at how easy installing Solus on a Macbook turned out given the issues I've read in the past with other distros.

Ah, but perhaps your suggestion might be better than what the OP has proposed; nothing wrong with that.

FrankenDebian? Ubuntu is based off of Debian, and uses all the same packages as Debian, so I hardly see the difference between it and Ubuntu. As far as OpenSUSE, I've got it installed on my windows 10, and can't get it to install FPC, joe, or any of my other utilities I usually use with it. I'd install Debian as my first choice, Linux Mint as my second choice, and last, and least of all, Ubuntu.

Between the two, the one that makes you update less is the LTS version. Tumbleweed is great but too bleeding-edge, where in LTS you can update less often or (nearly) not at all.

If it's really between SUSE and Ubuntu, I would go with Ubuntu. It has the most software compatibility and is quite stable.

If you're going for full-on reliability though, I would choose Debian stable. At the beginning of last year I started doing some research on which OS I should use long-term since I was due to start a PhD and didn't want to have to focus on my OS much at all. I ended up choosing Debian in April last year and have been with it since. It is highly stable and remarkably low-maintenance. I also haven't come across one piece of software that I can't use on it or which doesn't have a suitable equivalent.

The only issue I've had with Debian is that, very rarely, systemd will hang on start. The only way out of this is a hard reset. It's not a huge issue, more of a gripe. systemd is hard to avoid these days. I would recommend Slackware for full stability and reliability but it has a steep learning curve, and I don't think it's worth having as a daily driver unless you're willing to put a little more time in.

Bottom line: Ubuntu LTS or Debian stable.

What do you mean by that?

You should install gnome-logs and see if anything stands out that could be causing systemd to hang. I'm dual-booting Debian Stable and Unstable and I don't recall ever having a problem with systemd. Additionally, following is a nice recent writeup on checking log files for troubleshooting purposes:

https://linuxtechlab.com/important-l...entify-issues/

Debian. Accept no substitutes. Run it on my laptop, nothing but good going here. Had nothing but trouble with both of your options in the poll.

I think you should consider Peppermint. It is stable - currently based on ubuntu 14.04 LTS so most answers to questions one would have can be found in the ubuntu forums, lightweight and fast even for older hardware, incorporates ICE for easy use of web applications and what I think best is that out of the box it has always worked for me. The next release - likely in early summer if they continue as they have been - will be Peppermint 9 and based on ubuntu 16.04 LTS. I distro hopped for a number of years, but now every computer I own runs Peppermint - from a 2004 era laptop up to a couple of fairly new desktops with three other laptops and desktops in between. It ships with relatively few (compared to ubuntu) applications in the image, but as I'm sure you know, the debian and ubuntu repose are HUGE! Best of luck with your choice.

+1

The fuss I had with those debian / ubuntu based distros were just awful

And Suse has it's issues, 3 years ago, and 20 years ago when i used it as my main os.
What do you want wiht a distro where the network support is broken on different notebooks in the age range of 3-5 years? Means common network hardware is not supported. No network support, no chance to get a distro running. And fixing something which is broken, where any other distro like arch linux / linux mint / slackware runs in regard of network support.
Also the media support of SUSE sucks.

--

Gentoo is also not the best choice.
But when you have an ivybridge or better notebook cpu it's the best choice. (which is dated hardware by now)
My gentoo runs for years, no fuss with upgrades.
You put some efforts in maknig a gentoo box. But you should do that too for any config file for any other distro. so the arguing gentoo takes so long is just wrong. Also gentoo does not overwrite config files, you have to do it yourself. of course there is a way to autonuke config files. it is not suggested, but you can be that lazy. and in regards of kernel compilation, i suggest you do it, i saw many improvements from the first kernel to the latest one I made.

I have linux mint on another notebook which is sometimes put on the net and upgrades. For the past 5 years, regardless if it is linux mint or ubunutu, the package manager can not find the download files. The package manager has to be restarted several times to get an upgrade done. The package manager screws up the system: broken X server, broken bootloader, deleting grub.cfg without asking (that's is a philosophical approach: is it the user fault for editing the grub.cfg or is the developer an idiot for not parsing the grub.cfg and readding the menu items from the previous grub.cfg. in my point of view the linux mint developers are idiots for not thinking before nuking = removing critical config files)

Also gentoo has a decent way of downgrades. No binary distro can do that in my point of view. I can mainly only talk about arch linux and linux mint in this regards. Once a binary distro is screwed a reinstall is the only option in most cases.

How is Debian unstable as a desktop distro? Mind that I've an old Intel 330 SSD to which it is to be installed. Also, how frequent does it need updates?

I believe it has a much friendlier user interface and naturally is nearly infinitely customizable.

Read this, it will tell you all you need to know:

http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?p=531279#p531279

I use slackware because I started with it and am too lazy to change. Since I haven't used any others, my opinion isn't worth much. I update daily and have had only an occasional out-of-date library problem that Mr Volkerding fixes immediately, but I could always solve by linking the current version to the name the old one is looking for. I think that's an endorsement.