XPS 8700 Motherboard Ram Upgrade

Thank you

Ravi, that doesn't make sense. Are you saying that DDR3L runs at 1.5v?

DDR3L is a low voltage - 1.35v memory. 1.5v working is a doubt or you may have to work in your BIOS to make it play nice but that's not likely to happen. Go with 1.35V memory. 

Ravi,

I have a DELL XPS desktop 8700. I purchased two 8g DDR3, PC3-12800, 1600mhz 1.5v and the board only recognized 1 of the memories. The system on BIOS is reporting 8gb installed. I see a jumper close to the memory banks but I'm not sure if that is to enable more memory. Currently running Win7 pro. I was told this unit supports 32gb. It has 4 banks: 2 white banks, and 2 black banks. Any ideas what should I try to get the system to recognize16gb. ?   Thank you for your advice.

The memory should go in both WHITE slots.

A jumper should not be necessary to enable more memory, but you may need to update your BIOS to support it.

White or black slots do the same effect. The BIOS only recognize 8gb out of the 16gb. If I use only one memory the system beeps and don't start.

Where do I find the correct BIOS upgrade. Is it at DELL.COM using service tag ?

You can't use the black slots with two DIMM's.  You must use the white ones.  You should be able to boot it with a single memory stick, but it MUST be in slot number 1 - the middle white slot.  Try each stick alone in this slot.

What BIOS version do you have?

Thank you for your assist.

I had BIOS A03. I finished installing BIOS release A08 and now if I put the 2 memory banks the machine doesn't boot and emit a sound every 2 seconds. Weird... Thank you for your assist.

Just bought a XPS 870 with 16 GB Ram.

One big disappointment I have is upgrading the Memory from 16 to 32.

I bought it with the understanding that it can be upgraded to a maximum of 32 GB memory.

It can do that no problem. But one big Gotcha.

Dell sends this computer to you with all 4 memory slots full.

What a waste. Instead of the machine having 2  8GB memory modules, and leaving you 2 empty slot, they fill all 4 slots with 4GB memory modules, leaving you NO room for expansion or memory upgrades.

So what do you have to do when wanting to add memory and turn your 16GB into 32 ?

Instead of just buying  a 2 X 8GB upgrade of memory to get you to 32........you have to spend twice the money by removing all 4 of your 4 GB memory modules and purchase 4 (not 2) 8GB of memory.

Dell, you can do a lot better than this. If you want to advertise your computer is ungradable in areas such as memory. How about helping the customer out and give them a machine with a configuration that they can upgrade and if you can keep some slots open, do so. Filling all my memory slots up with small 4GB memory cards and leaving no room to add more is a disappointing fist impression of my new machine.

I somewhat agree with you SteveAndTerry regarding 16 GB spread across 4 sticks instead of 2 when the computer is capable of handling 32 GB memory.  I am sure the description correctly stated 4x4GB but they should give the buyer the option of 2X8GB for a small upcharge. 

Then again going with 16GB option (4 DIMMS) is a $150 upgrade to 12GB across 4 DIMMS.  So 2x8GB would probably be $300+ in Dell Land.

I just received my Dell XPS 8700 running Windows 7 and my box came with 2 8GB sticks in the white DIMMS. I added 2 more 8GB sticks to the black DIMMS and now have 32 GB RAM. Couldn't be easier.

Note: The DIMMS must be used in pairs. Both white DIMMS numbered 1 and 3 must both be filled to work, likewise DIMMS 2 and 4 must BOTH be filled to also work, ie: an 8 GB stick in DIMMS 1,3 & 2 will only yield 16 GB of RAM because DIMM 4 isn't filled. Also the sticks in each PAIR of DIMMS must be the same size.

Hope this helps

Dell XPS 8700 has 4x 240-Pin DDR3L/DDR3 SDRAM slots which support Dual Channel DDR3L

there must be a typo somewhere in the system documentation. The XPS 8700 uses DDR3 not DDR3L memory.

the xps 8700 RAM is 1.5V.

they should give the buyer the option of 2X8GB for a small upcharge.

It is cheaper to get the 8700 with only 8GB, and sell this on eBay and buy memory on your own.

The dell upcharge for memory is absurdly high.