Dell’s plans to sell Ubuntu ultrabooks this fall

Dell is in planning to start selling a limited number of laptops running on Ubuntu Linux this fall. In this line the first flagship will be Dell XPS 13 ultrabook aimed at developers and running Ubuntu 12.04.

For last few months the outfit has been running an exploratory project based on the idea. This is titled Project Sputnik, and Dell already offers a disk image that you can download and install on an XPS 13 laptop. Also Dell recently announced a beta program that would allow developers to sign up for an opportunity to purchase discounted XPS 13 models with Ubuntu pre-loaded.

Now this time in fall, the project will exit beta and offer the laptops more extensively although not too widely. Dell is still considering it to be a developer laptop and the outfit says the laptops will be offered in “select geographies,” which simply means they won’t be available worldwide.

As for developer software, they’ll include software for developing cloud-based apps on a laptop by creating “microclouds,” whatever that means.

This is not the first time when Dell is offering notebooks with Ubuntu. Few years ago the company offered netbooks with famous Linux-based operating system, as well as some higher-end laptops. But at the moment, the only notebooks available from Dell ship with Windows.

Now for this time the XPS 13 with Ubuntu is available from Dell, the ultrabook will be nearly a year old, and Ubuntu 12.04 will be around half a year old but Ubuntu 12.04 is an LTS or Long Term Service release for Ubuntu. That together makes it a pretty good choice for deployment by a big name PC maker looking for a little stability. Ubuntu releases new builds of Ubuntu every 6 months, but LTS releases only come around every 18 months.

The XPS 13 ultrabook features an Intel Core i3, Core i5, or Core i7 processor, a solid state disk with up to 256GB of storage, a 47Whr battery, 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 3.0, a USB 3.0 port, a USB 2.0 port, and a mini DisplayPort.

The XPS 13 ultrabook incorporated with an Intel Core i3, Core i5, or Core i7 processor, a solid state disk with up to 256GB of storage, a 47Whr battery, 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth 3.0, a USB 3.0 port, a USB 2.0 port, and a mini DisplayPort. This laptop weighs about 3 pounds and measures 12.4″ x 8.1″ x 0.71″.