Dell XPS 15 (9550) 1TB + 32GB SSD cloning

I currently own a XPS 13 9350 (w/ 256GB SSD) and am about to switch to a XPS 15 9550 (1TB HDD + 32GB SSD). I was considering swapping in a 500GB Samsung 850 EVO (2.5") into the new 9550, but after reading these forums I don't think I can complete all the steps without messing up. And if I wanted to return the laptop to Dell within the year, returning it to the initial state would be too hard.

I now am considering just cloning my current 9350 drive to the new 9550 drive. I am new to the SSD/hybrid drive scene, and am just wondering if there would be any problems cloning from a SSD to a HDD with SSD cache (hybrid?) system. I appreciate any advice given.

 

Yes, never clone to a dissimilar chipset, nothing but trouble, as for returning to Dell, they only want the hardware back, they will put a new image on the disks regardless of what is on it already. I send them back with no partitions at all after a good data destruction.

All you need to do is remove the 32gb SSD, fit your new drive & wipe the 1tb before installing to the 500gb (use the image in my sig to make life easy)

 

Thanks for the quick reply GoNz0,

Unless I'm reading your last sentence wrong, I can't fit the new drive because it goes it the same bay as the HDD. Apologies if I'm not understanding what you meant

 

Also, is there any difference between getting a 850 EVO m.2 vs 850 EVO 2.5" besides their form factors?

 

The only difference is you would be able to keep the 1TB drive in the system as a media drive if you wanted to.

What he was saying is to remove the 32GB drive to keep it from giving you grief when installing windows on the 2.5" ssd.

 

Hmm I hadn't considered that... That makes me want to consider getting a 256 SSD for the m.2 slot and keeping the 1TB, instead of just having a 500GB SSD 2.5" as the sole drive

 

Sorry I misread and assumed you were ditching the 32gb and keeping the 1tb.

But please try and up the budget to fit an NVMe in the m.2 slot replacing the 32gb so you have one hell of a fast boot drive with the addition of a 1tb for storage.

 

Haha you are really tempting me. If I get the 950 PRO NVMe 256GB, and keep the 1TB for storage, I don't think I would ever need to further upgrade my drives...

Are there any NVMe SSDs you would suggest besides the Samsung 950 PRO?

 

TheFenian13 -

For your purposes, I think GoNz0 has some good advice on the 950 PRO.

I have the same 9550 coming so am in a similar situation. However, I have an unused 2.5" Samsung 850EVO 250GB stashed away, so my upgrade "path" is a bit different. I ordered a m.2 Samsung 850EVO 250GB. And will retire the 1TB drive to a case for data backup purposes. Since I will have 500GB of fast SSD running I can wait 6 months or a year or two or whatever for NVMe speed and prices to improve.

I have two thoughts for you. First, since you can't really migrate drives from the m.2 to the big mSATA bay, you don't want to be throwing away a good m.2 drive in a year. Second, it might take a while for 950 PRO prices to drop significantly.

Also, note the OEM drives (like the 951s) may have shorter warranties than retail drives (like the 950 or 850) so this is not only a price-performance question.

There will be a lot of activity on the NVMe front this year, as Samsung releases more products and Toshiba enters the market. And there are others. I wouldn't assume this will push down the price of the premium 950PRO down for a while. Samsung has some tech advantages so some special market control. For example, they could accelerate the discounting of mSATA and keep the 950PRO pricing at a premium for a long time. Eventually everything will get faster and cheaper but this is a fragmented new market with limited direct competition.

Samsung table of current and upcoming NVMe
http://www.anandtech.com/show/10168/samsung-shows-off-sm961-and-pm961-ssds-oem-drives-get-a-boost

Toshiba release:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/toshiba-xg3-ssd-ocz-revodrive-400,4434-3.html

 

I have the 1tb Toshiba SG3 in my laptop, another members got a 512gb version, even the 256 benches the same, 2400/1500 an incredible drive and on par to thrash the 512gb 950 pro.

The SM95 is a good compromise over the 950 pro though, after that the PM951 is still bloody quick compared to a Sata based SSD/

 

Thanks for all this information, I'm going to mull it over and hopefully decide soon. I have multiple options all rolling around inside my head right now and I can't figure out what's best

 

FYI - I was informed by MacMall that the Samsung m.2 850EVO 250GB is finally back in stock and mine will ship this afternoon. For me this drive has an excellent price/performance ratio.

 

MacMall confirmed to me via phone that they didn't ship the drive and don't know when it will be in stock. So I cancelled the order.

Dell.com stated availability in ~3 days. Dell has a 10% discount & free shipping on some accessories, although the coupon didn't work on the internet shopping, it worked via chat.

 

Hello i have a question. I have a 256 gb ssd m.2 and a 1 tb sshd 2.5 drive. Is the laptop going to perform better in ahci or raid mode?

 

Neither.

Sent from my SM-G920F

 

So performance is the same?

 

Hence me saying neither

 

Guys i posted this in the xps 15 thread but posting it here as well since i see this thread mentioend laptop is 1tb hard drive and 32gb ssd which is the specs i have for this laptop that i just bought.


Hey guys i have a pretty big issue i think with my dell xps 15 9550. First off, i bought it online through ebay from a seller that has pretty much perfect feedback. The condition is Dell New Outlet. It has a 32gb ssd and 1tb hard drive 5400 rpm. I wanted to replace the 5400rpm with my old samsung 250gb ssd.


I went to repair shop and the guy was able to do this. He was surprised there was a 32gb ssd attached to it. Well after he did this, he went to disk management and wiped out my ssd so my C drive had like 2gb free out of 28.7gb... the 32gb ssd. The samsung ssd... showed 115gb free out of 232gb until he did the wiping and it has 230gb free out of 232gb free.


Well i downloaded a bunch of programs on the computer. I then no longer could download anything and noticed the C drive shows about 3mb free out of 28.7gb. So basically i got the message manage your storage or cancel and i clicked cancel. I had thought anything i download goes to this hard drive until it runs out, then goes to my ssd.


In another forum, i was told he should have copied windows 10 to the 250gb ssd instead. I did not ask him this because he had told me i was set. The thing was i thought everything was fine. But shouldn't he known that the windows 10 cannot be only on the 32gb ssd since it will eventually go over it due to updates and stuff like that?


someone else on another forum mentioned there should be no way dell installed the windows 10 on the 32gb instead of the 1tb hard drive. Is that true or false? I did buy this laptop on ebay though because i needed it very quickly and dell takes too long to ship. It is Dell New Outlet. But does Dell install windows 10 like this correctly or not?


And what are my options now? Do i have to go to repair shop and ask him to copy windows 10 to my 250gb ssd?

 

Your repair guys a complete idiot, windows should not be on the C drive and he should have told you this if he knew what he was doing.
Dell SCREWED UP as always with refurb 32gb 9550's and reinstalled windows to the 32gb instead of the 1tb (they always screw this up). the 32gb acts as a cache drive to make the 1tb drive appear faster for short bursts using intel RST to control this.

Take it back and point this out to him and ask for your money back then leave.

shrink the partition on the 250gb drive as much as possible and use macrium reflect free edition to copy the 32gb over to the 250gb then wipe the 32gb.

Macrium can make it bootable again, google how macrium can fix broken boot drives.

Once back in windows you can start to copy your stuff over to the new partition with windows on it and use disk management to adjust the partition size until you have cleared the old partition. Then delete that and expand the windows drive with your data on to fill the 25o.

You need to learn this sh1t instead of letting people rip you off fella.

 

Hi there sorry for crossposting. Will post it here now. Well my laptop was Dell New Outlet bought from ebay not refurbished.


Did i make any mistakes asking him what i wanted to do here? I mean it sounds pretty simple right... change my 1tb hard drive with my 250gb ssd?


I cannot do this myself as im worried i will mess up this. The partition, macrium reflect etc that is way too complicated for me. Swapping hard drive is simple for most people but i didnt want to dot this b/c i needed to get this laptop set up asap.


So if i have him fix this issue, what will i need to ask him exactly. Someone mentioned i gave him wrong instructions by asking just swap hard drives and wipe ssd. I was told that i should have asked him to change the location of windows. Is that correct or not? But even if i didn't, should it be obvious to him what i wanted?


Do i want the 32gb removed from the laptop? Someone in the other thread mentioned this so i keep everything windows 10 and everything in my 250gb ssd. Or should i just leave it there? Im also wondering, if the 32gb is removed, does the 250gb has to be moved to where the 32gb is since thats the C drive and the current ssd is in the D drive?

 

gonzo, so what should he have done on that day when i brought the laptop in? He should have either clean install or cloned/image the 32gb ssd to the 250gb ssd? Does that take very long? Does one take longer than the other? Which of these 2 should be preferred?


I cannot fix this issue myself and will go back to him because im not good with computers. Yes i know it sounds very simple to most of you, but im not tech savy at all. Im just frustrated that i found out this issue earlier because i thought my laptop was good to go and i was start downloading programs etc.

 

I already explained what he should have done, afraid I cannot explain it any more simply, maybe you jsut write that down and go show him?

You should also know that Dell outlet do not sell new laptops, they are ALL refurbished, returned, damaged etc.

Tell him this and do not let him charge you more as he should have done it in the 1st place.

 

Well i was told dell new outlet means the item either was ordered but never shipped due to cancellation or it was returned but it was unopened. Was told its the same as if i bought it directly from Dell outlet.


Well someone else suggested that i go back to the repair shop and tell them dell made the mistake of putting the windows 10 in the 32gb ssd. They said to have them either clean install or clone the 32gb into the 250gb ssd. So that is exactly what you told me but in different words right? The person on another forum said either have him clean install or do an imaging/cloning and that was up to me. Which of these would you suggest? Also so even after he makes the copy of it, does the 32gb still stay in the computer? Also you do not erase anything on it right? So theres the windows 10 on it as when arrived but i downloaded few programs on it already that i believed added storage to it.


Also wouldn't he need to change my windows C drive to the 250gb SSD? Because at the moment, the windows C drive is the 28.7gb one with very few space and the windows D drive where the SSD is where it shows 230gb free of 232gb is called Volume D Drive?

 

Yes i will write everything down on paper and show him but you mentioned it a bit different from another guy who made suggestions on what i should tell the repair shop guy. He used the word clean install or clone/image whereas you mentioned it was other words so not sure if you both mean the same thing.

 

No disrespect but stick to this or the other forum as I am not going to be part of 2 (3 the way you tried to head) topics on separate websites .

Any shop doing this for a feking living should have pointed this out to you and told you that you are wrong if you want to go ahead and leave windows on a 32gb drive when it has 1tb in it.

If I had a shop and you insisted on leaving windows on the 32gb I would have sent you on your way rather than have you come back 2 days later and ask for it to be fixed for free.


You should not be paying for this to be put right.

 

Just to add if it was new Dell wouldn't have needed to screw up the laptop by installing to the 32gb SSD so you have been scammed m8

they don't leave the factory like that!

 

Okay thanks for this information. The guy knows computers so i have no idea why he left it like the way it did. The thing is had i not downloaded a lot of programs, then i would have not known this until later on. I think he was shocked that he saw there was a 32gb ssd and the 1tb hard drive since hes used to one hard drive only.

Well yes i guess the laptop is refurbished then. The packaging there was no special box. Does every dell xps 15 9550 has a box for this package when bought new? There was none of this so i thought that was a bit strange. However, the condition of it looks pretty much perfect like brand new. I did pay a little bit less than the regular price though on ebay. However, the reason i bought this laptop was because i needed to get it asap.

Im heading to repair shop to see what he says about this. But just to make sure, i tell him okay my windows 10 didn't get copied to the 250gb hard drive and basically my hard drive is unusable because its basically full. When i tell him this, he should 100 percent know how to do the copy right? Do i need to ask do i need clean install or imaging/cloning? And about 30 minutes this should take right?

I paid $20 for him to replace my hard drive with the SSD and him doing wiping my hard drive so i thought that was pretty good price.

Im not sure how much this will cost but Im just confused why he did not notice this. I mean im someone that isn't familar with computers so is it horrible for me think... okay anything thats downloaded to the computer will go into the 32gb ssd and once its full, anything else is going to the other ssd? Or is my logic bad here? So after he puts windows 10 in the 250gb ssd, what does he do with the 32gb ssd? Does it leave it as is, delete it, take it out? Does taking it out cause issues? Does he have to put the 250gb ssd in the 32gb ssd slot? Also, does he have to make sure the 250gb ssd drive is in the Windows C drive as oppose to the D Drive Volume? Thats what the D drive is called when i click on it.

I have to make sure i have every step written down so when i ask him this, i do not omit anything at all.

 

hey man. Does him doing what he should have done in the first place generally cost a lot more? I only paid $20 for him to replace the hard drive in the dell xps with the ssd and then he wiped the ssd. that was pretty quick though. But if he did this in the first place what he didn't do, does that generally take very long or does it just take a few minutes? Because i believe it cost $100 or so for him to install windows or something like that. But does what you mention he should have done... that is still called installing windows?


Im heading there early tomorrow. I do know i have to pay but i have no idea how much this might be because i dont know what is the exact process of this called.