With Windows 11 looming on the horizon as an inevitability, maybe I'll just need to rip the band-aid off and jump to Linux as my daily driver, since my containers and servers both use it already.
KDE has a pretty good reputation from what I've heard, though honestly my previous choice was XFCE because it runs on pretty much everything (my old 4 GB netbook included).
My 2 cents: the best DE when coming from Windows is KDE. Kubuntu (ubuntu + KDE) is joy. It has a windows 7 feel, and is very customizable and stable.