Look no further than Debian. After switching from Ubuntu I started to understand why people view Ubuntu as a bit dirty.
For home use, Debian testing is usually a good balance between things not breaking and things not being ancient.
For servers, Debian stable is probably a better choice.
Even the current stable is fairly “new” so I don’t even mind.
In practice this means adding something like this to /etc/apt/preferences (along with adding entries for `unstable` in /etc/apt/sources.list)
# use `n=` when referencing codename (i.e. buster/bullseye/...)
Package: *
Pin: release n=bookworm
Pin-Priority: 550
# use `a=` when referencing archive (i.e. stable/testing/unstable)
Package: *
Pin: release a=unstable
Pin-Priority: 520
Maybe I've been lucky but I've been running testing on my non-server desktops and laptops for 13 years now and have only rendered my system unbootable once (required having to boot up a live CD to reinstall an older working version of some bad libpcre update that had been rolled out).
I think it's better to avoid pinning to testing since it gets a lot of updates right after a stable promotion (after the package unfreeze), which you probably don't want.
You can do that with any distribution, unless you expect your configs to line up exactly.
If you don't keep your /home on a separate partition, back it up. Install Debian, making sure to separate /home and root into different partitions this time. Go through your ~/.configs, find the ones you've changed (most of this will probably be browser shit) and put copies aside. Then take all of the configs out of your home directory backup (including the originals of your changed configs) and put those aside in a different place, deleting them from the backup of your home directory. Backup the virgin ~/.configs from your new install (do not delete them from the new home directory.) Then copy your old home directory files (sans configs) over your new ones using rsync. Compare your manually changed files to the virgin files from the install - has the format changed, will they still work? Are they located in the same directory in Debian as in your previous distro? If it looks fine, copy them in. See if they work. If they don't, look up why not. They probably will.
If you keep your home on a different partition, then install as if you don't, and let Debian create a home in the same partition as the new OS. Do the same config dance as above (annihilating your old configs other than the customized ones), and switch your /home to be mounted from your old home partition.
Or at least this is what I do. On your desktop, you probably want to install testing, on your servers stable.
Warning: if you're used to PPA life in Ubuntu Debian doesn't offer an equivalent that I'm aware of. EDIT sibling comments indicate home brew might solve this.
The problem with Debian is you can't usually pick "a thing" from another channel, you mostly have to fully commit. Testing is great until it isn't and anecdotally sid/unstable never fixed that for me - I just had to learn to build the occasional package from source
Ultimately I'm a lot happier having gone on that journey but it can feel very arduous the first few times apt doesn't have a recent enough version of something available
Look even further at Devuan, made by people who conder Debian as a bit dirty. (I use both as needed, I'm just riffing on your comment)
In what case do you need to opt for a different init system than systemd? Genuinely curious, as I've been using debian with systemd for almost a decade now and haven't run into any issues regarding it.
But really, the “I use both as needed” is the statement which pokes my interest. When do you need something else than systemd? What is the actual work which doesn't run with that particular init system? I'm honestly unsure if you were just joking or if there's really something more to it.^^'
If you want technological merit, chose Debian. If you want to join the conservatives of Linux, you should go for Devuan.
Debian is reputable because it is widely widely used for ages.
Devuan is not disreputable. It is simply a fringe variant of Debian that has much fewer users and no obvious reason to adopt for most people.
Debian has a good reputation.
Devuan does not have much of a reputation at all, because most people that might use it have no problem with using Debian and systemd.
No, it wasn't. There was only one ex-Debian person in their team.
I know it's weird for me to object to your comment without implying that you're insane. It's alright to feel like using systemd after a tangle of init scripts was a breath of fresh air. I understand that point of view. I don't understand the invective against people who put their money where their mouths were.
I understand that legacy users and orgs may have vested interests in sticking with older init systems, but personally I think systemd solves a challenging problem space in a very easy to use manner.
I much prefer writing a systemd unit file than having to wade into sysvinit or runit.
Politics aside - I just find systemd far easier to work with.
Long term though there's a query over support for anything other than systemd in Debian, hence the move towards Devuan.