groche

Nowadays a lot of hardware works very well on Linux, the main approach of this vendors is not the compatibility (has guaranteed but as you say in a thinkpad you have the same compatibility), the approach is about a free software (or mostly free) firmware, and in this case, free and secure implementation for the firmware an all secureboor chain

Nah you can have x3 load per core without problem. The real problem is when you haven't got enough ram xD

In my firs time with linux I install ubuntu (maybe 12.04, I dont't remember, it was gnome 2) in the only PC in my parents home, I delete windows, and we was using it 2 years without knowing what is a terminal and everything went fine, the problems appeard when I was discover the terminal hahahaha

With 8 or 16 GB of ram it would have been the best risc-v board excluding the milk-v pioneer

In my opinion the hardest thing in linux is leave to use propietary or exclusive software for windows, the first think you must do is leave to use propietary software in windows, and when you can live without windows exclusive programs, switch to linux. You can start for ubuntu or other linux friendly distribution, doesn't care, afther the migration you can try other for curiosity without risk