I'm a software engineer, so I really like techie stuff. I do coding and software infrastructure design on a daily basis.

Word of advice: be careful with Linux Mint. Make sure it isn't a huge battery suck. (Some linux flavors aren't designed with battery/power in mind; they just assume you'll be using a desktop, where battery doesn't matter.) You don't want to end up with a laptop that only lasts 2 hours on a full charge.

But on the topic of linux... favorite Linux OS is Fedora... but you have to be able to use a terminal comfortably. It's not really geared at beginners. (The learning curve is high for beginners, but it's definitely possible to learn it if you have patience.)

Fedora doesn't kill your laptop battery from my experience... and I have 3 laptops with 3 different OSes (OS X El Capitan, Windows, Fedora).

Edit: Ubuntu is very beginner friendly and might work out well for you if Mint doesn't.