Swapping SSDs between an Alienware 13 R3 and a Dell XPS 15 9550

Question

Hi experts, I have been using a Dell XPS 15 9550 for work since last August, and have just purchased an Alienware 13 R3 for better graphics. I'm worrying about the way to migrate from the former to the latter with least disruption. If I have to start with the new machine from scratch, it will take a lot of time to reinstall all the software, re-setup all the dev environments, etc. I'd really like to avoid doing all that. I'm thinking maybe I can just take the 1TB SSD out of the XPS 15 to directly replace the SSD in the Alienware 13 R3. There must be some drivers missing initially, but I trust that Windows 10 can work through these, and I can download drivers from Alienware 13's support site and install them. Has anybody done something like this and had success? I think what I'm facing is a common scenario in migrating to a new machine, and somebody must have tried this. I'd appreciate any insight and experience with this. Thanks! Harry

GreatArtist · Accepted Answer

Reporting back for the benefit of the community: the drive swap using syspref was successful. I have then installed all drivers from Alienware web site. Everything works as expected except two: bluetooth and AlienFX. The former is totally missing, and the latter with the tester showing 'no board found'. I'll create separate threads for these issue.

GreatArtist · Answer

As I continue to research the topic, I encountered articles about the "sysprep" tool that seems to be the exact tool for what I wants to do here (the article below has the details). Does anybody have experience with sysprep?

www.pcgamer.com/.../

Locked Topics – Alienware General

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