thank you for the recommendations. I'm fine with swapping OS's so even just compatible would work. The world seems awash in a million diffrrent laptops so it is a bit overwhelming!

any recommended mods?

Gonna just list the ones that really jumped out to me:
Event Horizon; Bladerunner & Bladerunner 2049; Pacific Rim; Johnny Mnemonic; Stalker; Solaris (1972); Robocop; Starship Troopers; Dredd; Tetsuo the Iron Man; Crimes of the Future; Pandorum; Fifth Element; Southland Tales

Sounds like he was in poor general health, fell down, and then died in his sleep. What is the "business" supposed to do about accidents at home?

Plex is great if you want to pay for features and need a media server/streaming platform hybrid

Got annoyed with Red Hat so moved to OpenSUSE. Easy transition, no issues so far woth Steam, Heroic, or Lutris

I recommend Fedora. It's rock solid while also having really up-to-date packages coming often. Not bleeding edge but deffo leading edge. Also has a decent amount of info online when you hit an issue.

I used to use Ubuntu but the older packages, and Canonical with their obsession with SNAP and becoming a baby Microsoft kept me away.

Arch is a good option and TONS of information online for help (some of the best) but it is a bit more DIY and is a rolling release so very up-to-date package but keep clear of Manjaro, just do base Arch. The folk managing it keep dropping the ball so not worth the headache

I can see it still as well, also on kbin