Dell xps13 9360 SSD upgrade to 1TB

(Am hopeful this does not cut across another thread)

I am the happy owner of 9360 with 512GB SSD.

I would like to swap this out for a 1TB SSD. I think I am comfortable with the mechanics of this BUT would welcome guidance on:
-- what are the compatible 1TB SSDs I should look at? I understand that I look at m.2 PCIe SSD but am a little confused at some threads talking about 'lanes'
-- whether I need to d/l drivers
-- which SSDs do not impact power consumption / battery power etc

Many thanks in advance

 

Tbh I just bought another Toshiba XG3 as these are excellent drives and seem to be going relatively cheap because many people want to upgrade to Samsung's 960/950 range. This is like twice the price and only a slight performance increase which isn't noticeable in general use or gaming so I didn't see the point.

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Pete - many thanks

To check:
-- 1tb version was OK?
-- was it a straight clone then swap-out OR do I need to install additional drivers?

 

1 tb version is fine. You'll only need the Intel drivers from their site if you're installing a new version of Windows on the new drive (as a Windows 10 boot image won't detect it)

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Thank you - sorry to be worriesome: if I clone current SSD (with existing Win10) onto the 1tb (i.e. The 1tb in an enclosure & connected by usb) I do not need install the drivers?

 

I don't know of any NVMe to USB enclosures. You can get one for a sata m.2 card, but that's not what the toshiba XG3 is (although I'm not sure what you are purchasing/purchased).

 

I agree, don't think you can do that unless someone knows better?

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I have been looking and apart from a £300 pcie to thunderbolt enclosure you are out of luck. And I think the 9360 runs at 2x pcie so you will not get full speed out a high end drive meaning a XG4 may be better suited if you can get it for less as it is slower. I may be wrong but if it is 2x pcie don't by a top of the range drive!

 

I'm planning to travel down a similar path. My 9360 with 7GB / 512GB arrived yesterday and I want to upgrade to 1TB. I'm considering the following drive.

Samsung 960 Evo 1TB M.2 (2280),NVMe SSD, R/W(Max) 3,200MB/s/1900MB/s ,380K/360K IOPS

Can anyone comment on whether this would be suitable?

Also, I was considering putting Windows 7 in the Windows partition after the upgrade, but since the 9360 comes with Windows 10 PRO I've decided I may as well lock that down and stay with it. What's the best way to get Win10 off the existing 512GB drive onto the new one?

 

FYI - The 9550 and 9560 TB3 ports definitely run at x2 pcie. Dell confirmed that recently.

Certain newer TB3 products will require some certification by Dell. For example, new TI83 chip eGPUs s not work on the XPS at this point. You will want to research that before buying goodies.

The following thread is the most informative on the net:

https://egpu.io/forums/pc-setup/xps-15-9550-not-able-to-reach-40gbps-over-tb3/

 

I am going to try upgrade to 1TB a little later this week:
-- My 9360 is currently 512GB; this drive currently seems to be Toshiba XG4 NVMe THNSN5512GPUK NV; this is 2-lane (x2)
-- Have splashed out on Samsung 960 EVO M.2-2280 1TB PCI Express 3.0 (x4) NVMe
-- Researching other threads the key thing is to check BIOS version; if I u/stood correctly this 1TB will not work with v1.2.3; I have upgraded this to v1.3.2

Will let you know how I get on....

 

The evo is a lovely drive but your speed will be crippled at 2x

 

(to check) Question: when 4-lane PCIe deployed into a 2-lane environment:
-- speed is throttled at 2x level (so advantage of 4x is lost BUT will be at least ~equivalent to the current Toshiba XG4 NVMe)
OR
-- conflicts arise which degrade speed to such an extent that speed falls below 2x level?

Apologies if this a basic question

 

Depends on the drive, sorry but that's a piece of string question as it depends on the drive speed and controller used. Only way to know is find someone who's done it.

 

Posted by Justin on the Dell community site last year:

XPS 13 9350/9360
Internal dives supported: 1
Drive configurations supported: (1x M.2)

PCIE Lanes:
The M.2 slot available supports up to 4X

Parts needed:
1x 4270E screw M2X3​

This appears to suggest that there is support for 4 lane PCIe drives.

 

To update those who may be interested: my swap to 1TB (Samsung EVO 1TB) completed last week & been running a week with no issues.

NB: you MUST ensure you upgrade BIO to v1.3.2 BEFORE you swap out (I have read of laptops being 'bricked' on v1.2.3)

I chickened out of doing the swap myself: opening the 9360 & swapping SSD is v s/fwd but I didn't want to take the risk of re-install myself. I asked the technician to ensure he installed all the 9360 drivers from Dell website. Running Win10 Cumulative Update for Windows 10 Version 1607 for x64-based Systems (KB4015438) no problem. Booting up takes just a moment longer than before but no other change in performance.

Just one thing: I have set log-in to PIN. On 2nd day I came across the message 'Your device is offline. Please sign in with the last password used on this device' when booting up but thankfully had wifi so it cleared on 1st go (& no nrecurrence).

thank you all for advice

 

I am intending to do a very similar move soon- how did you deal with cloning the old SSD to the new Samsung SSD? Also, when you talk about installing 9360 drivers, where do you refer to?