So for my birthday and Christmas I have been getting the components to build my own gaming PC. During that time I grabbed a copy of windows because that is what everyone does. After watching a few of the tek syndicate and linux channel videos I have decided I need a change. I have messed around with ubuntu and things before but not really getting anywhere because I was clueless and young. My question is what do I do? I am open to many ideas , really anything you guys can throw at me. Don't worry my steam library is mostly compatible with linux.
Make live USBs of distros you want to try out and do exactly that try them out before actually installing them. After you find something you like then install it. You can even do that alongside windows if you still need software that requires windows.
Then its all about using it it daily, trying to learn how you do things in Linux. Many are turned off because typical functions are done differently and the fact that these functions are not familiar to them makes them conclude that the OS is more difficult to use. That is not true. Its not more difficult its just different and it will just take some time to get use to it. As every new thing you learn does.
After that process trying to learn basic use of the terminal would be the next step. And then, well, improvise.
Just remember that Linux distros are community based, meaning that is how you search for answers. Searching on the internet, the respective wikis and asking on the respective forums.
Suggestion for you to try out:
Mint Cinnamon (my favorite for new users. Ubuntu based so they share the same software mostly) Zorin OS (also ubuntu based) Ubuntu variants (Official Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Xubuntu etc) Manjaro
PS
Like what? You just asked a question. NEVER be scared of that. The Linux community has a reputation of being elitist but for me that is bullcrap. There are the idiots of course. All communities have them. But them you can safely ignore and go on with your life. The reputation comes from people that for some reason translate the suggestion ¨Well you are doing it wrong, this is how you do it ¨ as ¨ well you are an idiot that does not know anything¨.
Never be afraid of asking anything. Everyone was a noobie once. On the same time never misunderstand the action of someone correcting you as them saying that you are not good or sth. Most of the times its just that and does not mean anything more.
If you have experience with Ubuntu I suggest you start with that and get comfortable with it. Distrohopping is fun but it's nicer if you know the basics before. Remember that any every distro can use every DE so that alone isn't usually that good reason to change.
I use Fedora myself although i tried most of the common distros (Ubuntu, LinuxMint, OpenSUSE and Arch) before settling on Fedora why did I settle with it? Because it felt good out of the box and was for me easiest to get working how i wanted although it's not hard on any distro.