It isn't just the cover art, they also A/B descriptions. And some of them are so different they're basically lies.
If you're comfortable, you're fine. Anything more would just be to speed up the rebuild, so it's less important if you don't mind taking the time.
It's even worse when you bake sourdough. I've been cultivating that yeast colony, caring for it, loving it. It thinks I care, but it's only being prepared for slaughter.
I've had a lot more luck running it in Docker with gluetun, along with qbittorrent in Docker. That way you can bind the whole qbit container to the VPN, which is basically bulletproof. All config options are available as Docker commands, you just need to use Proton's website to check the server list and pick your favorite p2p-enabled server.
It does take a little fiddling, but it's solid once you get it running. Port forwarding works too, once you figure out how to enable it.
Arch or EndeavourOS, depending on the machine's purpose and my mood at install time. I prefer rolling release, and pacman + AUR is a lovely combination.
You have some options here. Your new internet doesn't mean you can't torrent from home. If you're using a VPN (you really should be) then your ISP port forwarding doesn't even matter. You just choose a VPN provider that offers port forwarding on their end, like Proton, and use that port for qbit. The only real advantage to setting up at your parent's place would be if their connection was faster or more stable.
As for the server, the arrs can handle everything. They have settings (off by default) to rename and tag all of your files, based on rules you define. It's pretty easy to set it up to fully automate all of that processing busywork, so you just request things and wait for them to show up in Jellyfin.
Look into Caddy instead if you just need something simple for outside access. All you need is a DynDNS service (duckdns is easy), a few lines worth of Caddy config to point that address to your internal ports, port forwarding 80 & 443 to the machine running Caddy, and you're good to go. If you follow the documentation, you'll be running in 10 minutes.
These days, I'm partial to EndeavourOS with KDE for those kinds of installs. It's still Arch underneath, and I don't mind a "lazy" install for a DE.
It also gives you several DEs to choose from during install, so you can take your pick.
Docker is a cleaner solution for split tunneling. Container for the VPN (gluetun), and container for qbit bound to the VPN container for network access. You still need to manage the listening port when Proton changes it, but that's easy enough.
If you set it up right, it also doubles as a bulletproof killswitch since qbit can't see any other network.
You should be fine on basically anything. I have a similar-spec machine running Arch with KDE and it's rock solid.
If you want to "upgrade" a bit, sewing needles work much better than toothpicks. And they're almost as cheap.
Mint is always my recommendation for a Linux beginner. It's the most "it just works" distro I've ever messed with, and has plenty of documentation for anything you'd need.
As for advice: I know you want to avoid the CLI, but try to poke around in there and learn it some. Once you get used to it, you can accomplish a lot of things even faster than through GUI applications.
Both, but consumer is generally worse. For reference, check here for issues related to yours. The instructions are geared toward Arch, but the problems affect most distros.
Proprietary BS, Dell has become kinda notorious for that. A lot of their stuff has weird hacky workarounds to get Linux running properly. Unfortunately there isn't a great way to know that in advance, other than poking through wikis or asking around.
For most computers, it really isn't much different than installing Windows. Most things will just work, maybe a few drivers to install, and you're good to go.
Basically anything should work, I had one for a while running Arch + KDE. Wifi doesn't work out of the box (thanks Broadcom), but once you install the right driver it's perfectly fine.
If the computer is modern enough that you'd consider buying it to use, I can almost guarantee that you'll be fine to run the latest distros. I just threw Arch + KDE on a 14ish year old laptop I found, and it runs so well that I may daily drive it for a while just for the hell of it.
At worst, you may need a lighter-weight desktop environment (DE) than some of the pretty ones you see in screenshots. And those are simple to install and try out.
I've used both and much prefer Proton for sailing the seas. Connecting through France (highest speed + p2p) with port forwarding is the best torrent speed I've had on a VPN. The only slight annoyance is it switching the forwarded port every time it reconnects, but I run it 24/7 anyway.
Just skip the "official" client and run it through gluetun. It's a much better experience.
A Zero would probably be way underpowered for the job. I've used a Pi 4 in the past and it worked ok, but choked occasionally.
My actual recommendation would be a small x86 box, something like a Lenovo Thinkcentre Tiny. You can get them used for about the price of a Pi, and they'll be much more reliable.