Good that it has finally come.
Not sure where in the world you are but if your in the UK Dell may have been holding off because of the fluctuation in he dollar. If you look at DABS,SCAN and MISCO their prices of the I7 chip has gone up since its launch in November because the Pound has weakened against the dollar so badly. If your machine was coming from Ireland they were probably holding off alot of customers until they could buy a batch of the processors at a price where they still make money. I would not be surprised if you went to the Dell site now and specced the same machine it would be more expensive to reflect this.
Have fun - am tad jealous at the mo hehe
Cheers