The mini pc is the most flexible. Batocera works really well and includes:
Get a usb IR receiver like FLIRC or something similar with HDMI CEC to control everything via standard remote.
Scoop is preferred as it provides versioning and user installs compared to winget which are typically machine wide and require administrative roles.
Per one of the Arkenfox maintainers: “There’s nothing wrong with mozilla’s telemetry - it uses PRIO, and it uses GLEAN, and it doesn’t collect any PII, and it helps decisions upstream (and I’m not talking pedantic UI changes) that benefit everyone. Opt-in doesn’t work. I’m sure you can google why. There is no reason to distrust Mozilla here - you’re using their product” https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js/issues/1659#issuecomment-1518353397
That being said, if anyone wishes to block the telemetry you can do so by following the Arkenfox recommendations and setting up uBO: https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js/wiki/4.1-Extensions And/or a network wide DNS blocker (which OP did).
This is the first time I’ve heard anyone say Kodi has a learning curve. I’m curious what you found difficult?