XPS 8700, upgrades SSD, Ram, GPU

Question

Hello Dell community,

I own a Dell XPS 8700 since 2013 and think it is still worth a major upgrade. My main motivation is to turn-it on a good gaming-PC, capable of 1080/60fps .

The current specs are:

Core i7-4770 CPU @ 3.4 GHz

8Gb RAM

Nvidia GT 635 / 1Gb VRAM

2 internal HDD: 1Tb + 4 Tb

Windows 7 Professional

The idea is to add a SSD for booting/OS, increase RAM to 16Gb, and get an advanced GPU for 1080p gaming that is compatible with original 460W PSU. A few questions came to my mind ...

1) I noticed on the XPS8700-manual the presence of a mSATA slot available, so I'm planning to get a mSATA SSD. Will the SAMSUNG 860 EVO Series mSATA 1TB SATA III ( MZ-M6E1T0BW ) work well with the MoBo ? Can I boot from a mSATA drive ? Is that the fastest SSD that the old XPS8700 can handle ?

2) GTX 1060 seems to be a very powerful GPU, yet with only 400W PSU requirement. Is it compatible with the XPS8700 ? Am I going to fully utilize its processing power in a system based on old 4th-generation i7 CPU ?

3) Would I get any speed improvement by moving from Windows 7 to Windows 10 ? Or only more headaches :-) ?

4) I will likely turn it into a dual-boot system as well. Is dual-booting compatible with mSATA SSD as primary boot drive ? What would be a good version of Linux for the XPX8700 system ?

Thanks in advance for all comments/suggestions.

546insp · Answer

I would chuck the msata and dual boot ideas and just go with an ssd for the boot.

Pauluous · Answer

Thank for the suggestions.

Just a clarification: mSATA is the slot available on the XPS8700 MoBo to connect a SSD.

Are you suggesting to get a SSD from another standard ?

The Samsung 850 evo you have is not available as mSATA, but only as 2.5'' SSD for laptops or as M.2 cards (not supported by the XPS8700 MoBo).

The Samsung 860 evo is based on "V-NAND 3-bit MLC" technology, while the 850 evo is based on "3D NAND" technology.

Is there any clear performance advantage of the 850 evo over the 860 evo SSDs ?

For the 1TB capacity, M.2 850 evo SSD costs twice of the price a mSATA 860 evo SSD !

Again, thanks for the comments.

Pauluous · Answer

I want to increase my installed RAM from 8GB to 16GB

From the 4 DIMM sockets available on the XPS8700 MoBo, two are ocuppied with 4GB DDR3L each:

- Samsung M378B5173QH0-CK0 / 1.5V / PC3-12800 (800MHz)

1) If I understood the XPS 8700 specs correctly, I must get more RAM from the DDR3L type. Is this correct ?

I found Dell documentation saying that 4th-generation Intel processors do not work with regular DDR3:

https://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/04/sln153768/what-is-ddr3l-memory-?lang=en

2) Can someone recommend Brand/Part# of 4GB DDR3L 240-pin DIMM that are known to work with the XPS 8700 MoBo and core I7-4770 CPU ?

3) Is any of the models below suitable:

- CRUCIAL BY MICRON - DRAM CT2K51264BD160B 8GB KIT4GBX2 DDR3L 240PIN UDIMM

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA4M588K4286&cm_re=240-Pin_DDR3L-_-9SIA4M588K4286-_-Product

- Patriot 4GB 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model PSD34G160081

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220774&cm_re=240-Pin_DDR3-_-20-220-774-_-Product

Thanks a lot for the advise.

546insp · Answer

From Tom's hardware;

That's correct. DDR3L requires less energy to operate, and thus dissipates less heat but at the cost of some performance. Keep in mind though that modern DDR3L modules will perform better than older DDR3 modules simply due to improvements in design.

DDR3L modules are by design backwards compatible with DDR3 which means that they can be inserted into a motherboard that does not support DDR3L profiles without issue. I know for a fact that Hynix uses the exact same chips for both, and simply picks ones that have desirable performance characteristics for DDR3L. It would be possible to configure the complementary DDR3 modules to run at DDR3L specifications, but operation would not be guaranteed in the same way as configuring DDR3L to run at DDR3 specifications.

Pauluous · Answer

It is not easy to find 240-pin RAM explicitly labeled DDR3L for sale these days.

The XPS8700 MoBo requires DDR3L memory, according to the spec document.

The model below meets the DDR3L spec of 1.35V and 1.5V operation:

Crucial 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3L 1600 (PC3L 12800) Desktop Memory Model CT2K51264BD160B

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820156050

Pauluous · Answer

I would like to report a successful RAM upgrade I just performed on my XPS 8700 desktop today.

The original memory was 8Gb, as 2x 4Gb DDR3 PC3-12800 CL-11 from Samsung running at 1.5V

I added today another 16Gb, as 2x 8Gb DDR3L PC3_12800 CL-11 from Crucial running at 1.35V

Now the desktop has 24Gb RAM.

Very interesting: different brands, different voltages, working well ...

Pauluous · Answer

Is it possible to choose the RAM supply voltage on the XPS 8700 BIOS ? --- No.
The Crucial 2x 8Gb DDR3L PC3_12800 CL-11 I just bought/installed is specified as bivolt: 1.35V and 1.5V operation.
Although the original DDR3 is biased at 1.5V, the MoBo is biasing the Crucial DDR3L at 1.35V (as I mentioned on the message above). ---- How do you know this? Don't think it is.
How can I raise the DDR3L voltage to 1.5V, so all memories run at the same supply level ? --- No need to. They are already all running at 1.5v because some of them are regular 1.5v only DDR3. In fact I believe that our Dell operates only at 1.5v so even with only DDR3L RAM it will operate at 1.5v.
Is there any concerns that my memory modules are running at different voltages ? --- They aren't.

2004_4600 · Answer

My answers, based on researching the exact same situation for my XPS 8700, are after your questions:

Is it possible to choose the RAM supply voltage on the XPS 8700 BIOS ? --- No.
The Crucial 2x 8Gb DDR3L PC3_12800 CL-11 I just bought/installed is specified as bivolt: 1.35V and 1.5V operation.
Although the original DDR3 is biased at 1.5V, the MoBo is biasing the Crucial DDR3L at 1.35V (as I mentioned on the message above). ---- How do you know this? Don't think it is.
How can I raise the DDR3L voltage to 1.5V, so all memories run at the same supply level ? --- No need to. They are already all running at 1.5v because some of them are regular 1.5v only DDR3. In fact I believe that our Dell operates only at 1.5v so even with only DDR3L RAM it will operate at 1.5v.
Is there any concerns that my memory modules are running at different voltages ? --- They aren't.

--- In my experience Crucial has more reliably accurate info about compatibility than Dell. Sad but true. Read

https://www.crucial.com/usa/en/what-is-dual-voltage-memory

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XPS 8700, upgrades SSD, Ram, GPU

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