I want to like this machine, but it comes stock with 8GB of RAM and only a 256GB drive for the high end model with no options to upgrade (at least on Dell's site).

Just wait a little longer. If you go to the project sputnik google+ page you'll see Barton George say they're clearing out the old stock before releasing the developer edition of the new skylake XPS 13s.

You may have just made my morning!

Is there any chance they'll update the version of Ubuntu? 12.04 is.. old.

The current models ship with 14.04: http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/xps-13-linux/pd

Annoyingly, neither the price nor the spec have been updated recently. The non-developer XPSes are already on Skylake and come with more RAM and storage: http://www.dell.com/uk/p/xps-13-9350-laptop/pd

Does this link work for anyone else?

Works for me.

Seems to fail on mobile.

12.04 is still under LTS support by Ubuntu for another 4 years (LTS releases are supported for 7 years), so even if it's "old" it's also receiving active support. That being said, there's nothing stopping you from upgrading to 14.04 yourself.

small correction, Ubuntu supports LTS releases for five years. Support for 12.04 ends in 14 months, in April 2017: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Releases

Thanks! I swore it was 7, but you're completely right.