Emacs

I know this question has been asked before and I know about org-roam, I am just not sure if org-roam is the right solution for me. Right now, I use one big org file to take notes which I export to pdf. This works nicely, but it would be nice to also have access to the concepts in the larger org file at a granular level (ie. bite-sized notes which reference one another and are organized based on their subject matter). I would also like to tag information that is not in org format, if possible. I was thinking that org-roam & org-transclusion could be used to make main subject files, while org-roam could be used to make a link to an embedded pdf that comes from the concept I am referencing, when I don't need to explicitly review the material in whatever notes I am taking. Has anybody done anything like this? Any tips are appreciated. Thanks.