No hate to Ubuntu LTS (my old OS) as I think for an entry to Linux, it’s about the best there is, and then I just got used to it and then I started getting more and more annoyed with Snaps.
FFWD a couple of years and I decided to switch to Mint but I wanted something that was entirely free of Snaps, not just blocked, so LMDE seemed the best fit. I get all the good bits of Mint without the Canonical enforced stuff. It’s been running a week now and after plenty of tweaks (installing Gnome for example) looks and feels exactly how I wanted it without interference from Canonical.
I should’ve been clearer - the speed issues were to do with installation (and updating) rather than running speed. The whole process seemed very slow and hung quite often. But, as I just said to @Varyk, maybe that was a misconfiguration on my part.
I’m definitely not an Ubuntu hater at all, its just the culmination of a few things like the Snaps coupled with Canonical’s slightly weird attitude was enough to make me want to switch.
As for LMDE, I definitely recommend it. It’s solid as a rock and once I put Gnome on it, was exactly how I wanted it.