The Dell Sputnik forum has been somewhat useful, but mark me interested in a possible third party forum/list for sputnik users. I'm still running 12.04 (plus too many PPAs for apps) on my Sputnik beta XPS. Lots of folks are doing fine with other Ubuntu but I'm waiting for another LTS.
I mostly use Gnome classic and Gnome 3, fwiw.
Other than the touchpad still being too sensitive for my preferences (this gripe not limited to the XPS) it's been a awesome machine. It was my first SSD machine and still boots so fast. I'm jealous of the newer CPUs especially if battery life extends.