Upgrading Dell XPS 15 to 1TB NVMe SSD

[@EduardoRomano71]

To anyone interested in doing this, jus for safety , I suggest to unplug the battery. Do not add any thermal strip on the heatsink pipes, to avoid bending them against the back cover also pressing on both CPU & GPU! Since you are there, won't hurt take the opportunity to remove the collected dust from the vents. Good luck.

[@guillermosolorzano4316]

Just get an external enclosure for the old SSD. Worth the buy.

[@Breezy.m16]

Nice guide. I've just done this because the small 32 GB m.2 had stopped working. Now my laptop is flying again.

[@KIIJJY6969]

bought a 9550 while watching this, thanks for the info man, sick of buying laptops you cant upgrade/repair yourself.

[@Marcthegeek]

Oh yes, I always make sure I can upgrade the Storage and Ram before buying a laptop. Thanks for watching.

[@chasenthehype]

Yeah, that was one of the major reasons I went with the XPS (9550) at launch as well. Laptop is still cranking along - and has handled all my video and photo editing with ease. Paired with a Razer Core X eGPU, it's also a pretty solid gaming machine to boot! Definitely worth every dollar spent. Enjoy yours!

[@HCJJEONG]

Great vid! One thing i wanna point out is make sure you unplug the battery connector. if you don't, remaining electric current on the board may damage your computer or hurt you bad. just a safety measure.

[@moonlightcayenne8722]

How do you disconnect the battery please? I’m upgrading my SSD soon

[@HCJJEONG]

@@moonlightcayenne8722 Well, If you are using a laptop which has removable battery, just remove it. Or There must be a connector on the mainboard which connected to the battery. just unplug it. Google your laptop model name + disassembly or teardown (ex. xps9560 teardown) there will be some posts which will help you step by step.

[@moonlightcayenne8722]

@@HCJJEONG I have the exact same laptop in this video just a newer model of the XPS 15. I probably won’t remove the battery but will instead just remove the cables that connect it to the motherboard while I replace the stock SSD that comes included. Thanks for the advice really appreciate it 👍🏼. Would it just need to be a single battery connector that needs to be removed or both cables.

[@HCJJEONG]

@@moonlightcayenne8722 just a connector. after unplugging it, wait 5 ~ 10 mins. then u r set to go.

[@moonlightcayenne8722]

@@HCJJEONG Thanks so much dude this really helped!

[@Tech1Tv]

I got a Samsung 970 PCIe SSD last year and it's fast. SATA III SSD still fast but PCIe SSD is on another level

[@Marcthegeek]

Samsung are very good, even better but more expensive.

[@FeinesFabi]

Nice. I love how simple and user friendly this is.

[@jinraigami3349]

You should clean the fans and reapply thermal paste.

[@SynthoidSounds]

Thanks for posting this, I'm about to do this exact procedure, on a Dell XPS 13.

[@unkownGUY481]

Did you set SATA operation to AHCI?

[@nadtz]

For anyone who might need one of the t5 screwdrivers it's properly known as a torx driver and you can get decent ones cheap on Amazon which I happen to have on the way since I have to replace my keyboard cause a few keys died for some unknown reason. Good to know NVMe drives have gotten so cheap, maybe I'll upgrade that for now while I wait for a nice ryzen 9 laptop to come out that I want to get when I'm finally willing to kick the upgrade bullet. And your old drive was a hynix, didn't know they were making OEM SSD's!

[@aaronphilip9461]

I used the usb method and it worked great!

[@SonnetGomes]

Thank you so much for posting such a helpful video. I have a question though, does all M.2 PCIe NVMe supprt 1 TB SSD? I think my Dell Inspiron only allows 512 GB. That would be such a bummer.

[@Rich7714]

Why does it say online that there are 2 SSD slots available? There is only 1, right?

[@jakewilliamson]

thank you for uploading this - i ran into the exact same issue with windows in that the recovery wouldn't work... so i used the windows creator tool to create a usb installation disk and i've got windows installed. however... during the set up, it doesn't allow me to connect to the internet! so i've skipped that step and allowed the install to continue thinking i could install the drivers from the dell support page... no joy: i get a 'this isntallation is forbidden by system policy. contact your system administrator' - what the?!?! can't get around it as windows 10 home doesn't have a group policy editor... spend hours trying to solve it but nothing so far works... such a pain - the machine is up and running with windows but is unusable.

[@JK-bp9fh]

Hi if you just change to the new ssd withiut any back up procedures does the laptop facotry reset? Like a new laptop

[@marcodeluca4068]

Awesome but what about operating system ?? And data?

[@eleishatamiyaj.8470]

Extremely helpful

[@ralflemoine1970]

Any idea if the Dell XPS 15 (9550) has room to host a double side M2 SSD or only single side SSD?

[@organicskating]

Would this be sort of similar in upgrading a Dell XPS 15 7590? I made the error of getting a small 256GB hard drive instead of a 512GB hard drive and I can't return the laptop anymore to Dell...thanks

[@TheLarryOBrien]

So how do you fix the partitions after the re-image

[@brandonmoffett2255]

thanks for the video!

[@sjsphotog]

Note the max RAM allowed on the XPS 15 9560 us 32 GB of 2 sticks of 16 GB each. they have to be the same size so when you said 24 GB that wont work it needs to be either 1 stick of 16 GB or two x 16 for 32 max GB, which is what I am doing soon to go from 16 to 32 for my photo ediitng

[@DJAslan1]

You can run 64gb as long as it is 2666mhz or less, I am running one 3200mhz and one that is not. I bought 2 x 3200mhz and it did not work. From what I heard you can run 2900mhz, but you would have to find the memory

[@aarontongon6908]

Hey Marc, great video! I just got a Dell XPS 15 (9510) for my work in school and 512 GB is just not enough. I don't know anything about upgrading computer components or windows recovery. Would this process be the same for windows 11? Can I copy all my other programs to an external hard drive and transfer them later? I've downloaded Solidworks, LabVIEW etc. Would I have to reinstall them?

[@eprice2294]

Luckily the 9510 actually has two ssd slots, so if you so chose you could just throw another ssd in there and not have to remove your c drive at all. This means you would get a whole other drive for storage without having to re-install or recover anything.

[@CoyoteConrad]

Are you still satisfied with the WD SN750 in your XPS after a year? In particular, doesn't it get too hot while playing? I have an XPS 15 9550 and I am wondering which ssd to choose.

[@Marcthegeek]

It's still working great since day one

[@juanete69]

Is there space to add an ssd heatsink?

[@marcellochriscitiello1870]

Is it necessary to re enter windows activation key after transferring the operating system to the new drive?

[@enri_1986]

I don't think so. The key should be in the BIOs.

[@moonlightcayenne8722]

No the activation key is stored in the motherboard. It will automatically be applied once you’ve finished installing Windows 10

[@sjsphotog]

​@@enri_1986 yes its hard coded into the Motherboard/Bios from Dell. I researched this recently and found out that you dont have to do that hassle.

[@PireFirebat501Protoss]

Great tutorial video! I have a XPS 15 9550 and replaced a 256GB nvme with 1TB nvme SSD. However, UEFI BIOS is not able to detect either a new NVME 1TB or USB Drive upon booting up the system. Only with a legacy boot mode, my laptop was able to detect a new NVME and USB Drive. I am wondering if you have any tips. FYI, I updated bios to the latest and my dell xps 15 was on RAID mode by default. Thank you in advance.

[@robertomarsachjr3796]

Set the SSD in the BIOS to AHCI. That should resolve the issue.

[@Breezy.m16]

@@robertomarsachjr3796 Is this why on my XPS 15 it has a ssd to boot up but I cant actually see the hard drive or use it when i look in my files, so you change it to AHCI if I upgrade and it will act like a normal hard drive?

[@flowers4astronauts]

@@Breezy.m16 In RAID (default) it acts as a cache for the HDD via Intel Rapid Storage Technology (SRT). Having it run this was makes it non-bootable. If you want to use the SSD/m.2 as a primary bootable drive, then you'd probably have to change it to AHCI rather than have it use for cache

[@AnshuKumar-jn7br]

Is WD Black SN850 supported with XPS 9560?

[@360gradenpanoramafotografi7]

Repaste the CPU and GPU a Dell XPS 15 is also not a bad idee! Dell is using creapy colling paste. And please clean the fans of your XPS.

[@ZaidAl-Shayeb]

Can the XPS 15 9560 handle an SSD NVMe 4TB drive?

[@711Hancer]

does it same on P56f model?

[@S0UNDWAVE]

I tried to change my HDD to an NVME SSD and I managed to get it working but sadly my computer wouldn’t boot into windows all the time. Had to return the SSD sadly.

[@juanete69]

You need to change the seetings in your BIOS. Probaly set it as UEFI. And of course install Windows.

[@joel117-cge]

how long did it last? There's a lot of reviews on amazon saying its not reliable

[@Marcthegeek]

Still working till this day since I made the video. Knocking on Wood.

[@joel117-cge]

@@Marcthegeek ok great, I’ll use this to upgrade my xps 15 9575

[@manuvb4366]

Great video!, looking for upgrade an old latitude 7280 with one of these, I found this video... excellent explanation man... ;)

[@sojourner.42]

Don't you need a heatsink on top of the ssd to use with the thermal pad?

[@Marcthegeek]

No you don't

[@sojourner.42]

@@Marcthegeek Thanks

[@callmehank88]

@@sojourner.42 It's is meant to make the connection between the SSD and the aluminium case, so essentially the bottom case of the laptop becomes the heatsink.

[@gaunit5060]

Thanks a lot!! now that I have seeing it, I can say it's easy :)

[@billtang8217]

Somehow one of the screw won’t unscrew , I can even put my SSd in

[@HOTPLATEGAMING]

Brand is SK Hynix

[@LuigiZambetti]

The Dell XPS 15 has only one SSD?

[@StillConfusing]

most of them come with a large battery that takes up the place of a sata ssd, leaving you with only 1 PCIe ssd m.2 slot

[@LuigiZambetti]

@@StillConfusing Ah, that's a pity. Thank you for the response.

[@huey1153]

Luigi Zambetti The xps 15 base model has 2 m.2 slots, the 4K touch screen has 1 to compensate for the bigger battery.

[@sjsphotog]

@Lauren Eggers Yeah I got the non touch screen for my photo editing and so I believe I only have the 1 NVMe slot in my 9560

[@shivkj1697]

Does Dell XPS 9560 support NVMe M2 4D?

[@shivkj1697]

I know it works for 3D

[@utobesuckslol6687]

@@shivkj1697 Yes, but it won't bring out its full potential.

[@ULi3MURKFQ]

Bro what model is that laptop

[@nadtz]

Dell XPS 9560, says it in the BIOS.

[@juanfossatti]

Can you upgrade the XPS 13 7390?

[@zeppelin0110]

I looked up this SSD on Amazon and it seems to have a high failure rate. Pretty scary.

[@rebelfaiz9691]

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[@rebelfaiz9691]

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