It will depend on the distro as to how you go with safe graphics. As for advantages to using native drivers, not really sure. A few years back I would always go with Nvidia as things did not run smoothly with the Nouveau/X.org drivers but these days they seem fine as well.
Have not used Ubuntu on a Defiance series laptop but have on several PCS machines and it is usually straightforward. Installing in safe graphics mode is a good idea, otherwise everything should be fine out of the box.
Music is one of the things Sky have been good at for a long time, all varieties of it.
Think it would have been a bigger betrayal of age had you mentioned concerts by George Formby and Vera Lynn :)
Cannot see any major problems with that and Linux, Manjaro usually runs well but would install in safe graphics mode to start with.
Think the Intel drives are ok with 'nix, there were problems in the past with some drives but that was a couple of years back.
Covid-19 may have played a part but Charlie Watts had had throat cancer a few years ago. Still very sad to see him go.
Another two I am surprised are still going strong Ray and Dave Davies, although not so much normal health issues, it is a miracle one has not murdered the other, the Kinks have...
Tongfang are not great but I have never had a laptop when the touchpad never worked. My first thought is have you run Windows on this, could it be a dodgy touchpad - that should have been checked at PCS but things come loose in transit.
The credit card has taken a bad hit again and the data corrupter is on its way, along with an amazing delay pedal, the Adineko Oil Can. Anyone who has used and liked the old Oil Can Delays will love this and it has a big advantage over a lot of the models about in the 1970s, it is much less...
I rarely use Fedora so cannot help there but something I noticed on some PCS machines, including two Optimus was that they were ok with nvidia drivers but not always the latest ones. A main problem was a log in loop but that could be solved by purging the nvidia drivery via a ptty terminal and...
Sainsbury's are now stocking a very nice Kimchi, the Vadasz Raw is good, not sure about the Yukata version they do as not tried it yet, will report back after a tasting.
Modulation is great fun and sometimes is actually usable, plus who could resist a device called a data corrupter.
Interesting interview with the Earthquaker guy and looks at a few of his pedals.
That is some beast of a guitar, only thing that would put me off would be by the time you had tuned it you would be too tired to play :)
I had a Jazz copy years ago and that was a decent guitar. The five-string is getting much more likely, although having small hands as well I will be trying a...