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XPS 8900, adding a second mSATA SSD?
Hi,
I have an older XPS 8500 with a 32GB SSD installed and would like to take that out and add it to my new XPS 8900, that already has a 32GB SSD installed.
Can I do this (have 2 SSD drives?) First, is this worth doing? What would be the advantage I could gain? And if doable and advantageous, what do I need to do to install the 2nd SSD? And is there anything I need to be careful of or recommended setup to make the most out of the 2nd (additional) SSD drive?
Thanks!
Morgan
DELL-Chris M
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April 22nd, 2016 16:00
In the below picture of the XPS 8900 motherboard, there are two M.2 slots, #9 and #21. We install a WLAN card in #21. But you could remove it and install another mSATA drive.
The next thing to consider is which of the current drives is hosting the operating system. If the operating system resides on the current mSATA drive and the data is on the slower sata 3 drive, there should not be any issues adding another storage drive. Also be sure to create the operating system backup DVD or USB key in case you need to reinstall. Then take pictures of the bios screens to reference when you change the hardware. Take some time and read through this thread.
DELL-Chris M
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April 23rd, 2016 15:00
If the boot OS is on the XPS 8900 mSATA, then no. If the boot OS is on the XPS 8900 sata 3 drive, then yes. But it would be far simpler to just copy the data from the XPS 8500 drives onto an external USB key or external USB hard drive. Then copy them to the XPS 8900.
datapod
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April 22nd, 2016 09:00
There's only one mSATA slot on the MOBO so installing a second is not doable sans a add on adapter of some sort to no advantage. The mSATA in there now is just a small cache drive that accelerates a larger HDD using IRST.
downloads.dell.com/.../xps-8900-desktop_service%20manual_en-us.pdf
Ordinary 2.5" SSD's are no problem.
datapod
371 Posts
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April 22nd, 2016 18:00
TIL you can put an mSATA drive in the slot occupied by the WLAN card.
I was not aware.
Thanks
NorthGeorgiaGal
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April 23rd, 2016 07:00
Thank you so much for the informative reply. After investigating further - I think I will replace the current (oem) msata with a larger one and boot/store programs from there. One additional question before I do that,
I have some data installed on the old msata from the XPS 8500 - can I switch the msata in the 8900 with the msata from the 8500 to pull the data off of it, temporarily (or can I keep it there until I replace with larger msata)?