XFCE is the distro for getting stuff done. I run it even on new PCs. I know that whatever device I'm using, because of XFCE, my desktop is gonna be blindingly fast. I try to switch to other desktops sometimes but I always go back to XFCE because the speed and reliability are off the charts. Windows wishes it could be this (it kind of was, in the XP or 7 era).

I would go with the regular desktop version of Ubuntu because while laptops work just fine as personal/small-scale servers, the idiosyncracies tend to be around stuff like sleeping, power management, what happens when you close the lid etc. Whether you'll encounter any of that depends in part on the laptop make and model, but Ubuntu Desktop is probably the most polished distro out there in terms of handling those things.

While it's not an immediate solution, Framework laptops are way ahead of the curve in terms of open sourcing their firmware, and being open and Linux-friendly in general. The Framework 16 should be out by the end of the year and will support an external gpu.

Whether RedHat is violating the GPL by cancelling the contracts of customers who exercise their rights under the GPL is an open question. There certainly is not a consensus on this in the open source community, the Software Freedom Conservancy seems to lean toward the view that RedHat's new policy is in violation - https://sfconservancy.org/blog/2023/jun/23/rhel-gpl-analysis/

However the only way to find out is for someone to challenge RedHat in court. IANAL but if you could demonstrate in a court that RedHat has actually had a pattern of behavior where they are canceling contracts whenever people exercised their rights under the software license, I think you might have a pretty good case. IBM for their part has good lawyers and is basically saying bring it on, this is business.