First order of business: Welcome!
Trying to sort out what hardware to use can be tricky. These guys are a notch out of date in their hardware, but with a little forum digging it looks like X570 boards are a safe bet if you can find one. My X570-I from Gigabyte definitely has support.
I have more experience with Debian as well, but I’m expanding the stuff I know by following Sgt. Awesomesauce’s guide. There’s a lot in there that’s not specifically what you’re looking for, but I was sold on trying Manjaro because of the suggested custom kernel (and putting ZFS to use).
He hits on a lot of the particulars already. I can’t be of much more help 'till I spend a little time and dive in.
Best of luck!