The Project Sputnik Beta program has been going for several weeks now. We have 
an intrepid group of cosmonauts and there have been a bunch of blogs posted, tweets tweeted and a flurry of activity on the forum.
In general the feedback has been very positive with some folks having issues around wifi and the touch pad.
So far four of the cosmonauts have posted detailed entries around their Sputnik experiences. Here are excerpts from the postings.
The Sputnik Out of Box Experience
For a good look at the OOBE, complete with photos, check out Theron’s “#ProjectSputnik – first impressions“. Here’s the summary at the end:
After initial load and getting my standard working environment up and running, I’ve got to say this little beast is pretty amazing. From the tight OS integration to the feel of the laptop, it looks and feels like a solid build. I’m going to be busy working with OpenStack over the coming months and I’m excited to see how closely integrated I can get my build envionment on this laptop to the ubuntu server I’m using for testing. After watching Mark Shuttleworth talk this year at Oscon about JuJu and #ProjectSputnik, I’m pretty sure it’s going to be amazing. More blog posts to follow.
One man’s journey back to Linux
This next blog kicked off a huge discussion on hacker news around developer laptops, OS’s and the merits of their various incarnations. Geoffrey Papillion wrote about his odyssey through time and across various OS’s which has led him to the present and Linux once again.
Here is how he concludes his post “Thanks Mr. Jobs, But it seems I can use a linux laptop now”
Two days ago I got my Dell XPS 13 as part of a Dell beta progam called project Sputnik. I got a special version of Ubuntu, with some kernel patches, and some patched packages for sleep and hibernation. After an hour of struggling with making a bootable USB drive from my Mac for my Dell(turns out it was an issue with the USB drive), I had a working computer. By 8pm I had my development enviroment setup, I had chef up and running, and even my VPN was working. I was amazed.
So, far its been good; most apps I use are web apps. I spend 70% of my time in a terminal, and 30% of my time in a web browser. Honestly its the perfect computer for me right now. So, I’m waving goodbye to the ecosystem Mr. Jobs built, and moving to the world of linux full time.
On Beyond ThinkPad
Matt Urbanski who is coming from a linux mint based Lenovo ThinkPad x220 that he has been really happy with, gives his initial thoughts in Project Sputnik Beta Day one. He concludes his post with:
I sound much like a crochety old man who dislikes change. I’m going to give this a go and see what happens. I’m now embarking on the always annoying task of getting my homedir and configurations from one machine to the other. I’ll report back after some real usage.
The Woodward Trilogy
The most prolific cosmonaut award goes to Matt Woodward who has been putting his project Sputnik laptop through its paces and written three entries about it.
Dell Sputnik: Initial impressions
Conclusion: The Dell XPS 13 is a huge winner in my book. It’s exceedingly well built, light, quiet, and has all the bells and whistles you need in an ultrabook — particularly one aimed at developers — and Dell made intelligent omissions across the board with the possible exception of the amount of RAM pre-installed.
If like me you’ve had Dells in the past and hadn’t thought about Dell in a while, this machine may well change your mind about Dell. After only a few hours of using it it’s certainly starting to change mine, and I can already see myself gravitating to the Sputnik as my go-to machine.
Dell Sputnik: Battery life test
Results: The results are quite impressive, with a run time of about 8 hours 20 minutes in my usage
A week at a conference with Dell Sputnik
Summary: After living with the Sputnik as my only machine for a week I continue to be extremely impressed. Particularly in a developer conference situation where power isn’t available at every seat and you have to fight for the few outlets that are available, the Sputnik’s fantastic battery life let me focus on the conference instead of worrying about whether or not my laptop was going to conk out.Other than the occasional issues with the trackpad I thoroughly enjoyed using the Sputnik at DjangoCon — it makes a great conference companion!
So that’s the initial round up. Stay tuned for more!
Extra-credit reading/Resource links
Pau for now…
Posted by Barton George 
Barton's Blog 