Mint is pretty solid out of the box, better than Ubuntu imho. You could also go the other route, install ubuntu server or something and install x, your preferr

Mint is pretty solid out of the box, better than Ubuntu imho. You could also go the other route, install ubuntu server or something and install x, your preferred window manager and all that stuff yourself. Have been running a desktop setup like this for 3/4 years now and never had any issues other than having to reconfigure some *cked up X settings after dist-upgrade.