Good to know. I am thinking about getting this laptop.

It sounds like you did a fresh install when you got it. Is that correct? Did you follow any special instructions to do the fresh install? Did you go with 15.04?

Yes, correct. I need full disk encryption for work and the factory image didn't provide that. I assume because of the hidden partition for factory-reset.

I went with 14.04 LTS because of the longer support, but from what I read 15.04 fares slightly better. Taking everything into account I'm very happy with the XPS13. The mic issue isn't all that much of a problem. I'll just wait till there's a fix and use my other PC when I need to use Skype etc. The 3 buttom emulation would be more convenient but I can live without.

I see. Thank you for the reply and information. This helps.

So you did not have to do a lot of configuration, such as:

http://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/SLN297060/EN

? for me it is very important to be able to just plug in an Ubuntu USB install key and just install from there. I often do fresh installations.

Tukcedo, that is great to know. Is there anyway you could do me the favor of giving the steps to put the wifi driver on the install stick? I am quite ignorant of such things, so a step-by-step advice would be extremely useful.

No, it was pretty minimal actually. If you can live with those shortcomings I mentioned then it's a beautiful machine and installation goes smoothly. The only thing I had to do was put a wifi driver on the USB install stick and insert the module after boot. That was quite simple.

I used these (quite simple) instructions here below. Does that help?

forthescience.org/.../xps13.html

Yes, that should help a lot. Thank you!

I will study the instructions and try to follow them and if I run into a problem I will create a new post on this forum.

Thanks for all your responses and for allowing me to semi-hijack your original post :)