XPS 8940, add 2nd 3.5" HDD

Thanks all for your input.

Gopal - The Dell documentation on the XPS 8940 is incorrect. As kanadian-kaos correctly pointed-out, there are in fact (2) 3.5" hard drive cages in the XPS 8940. I received my Western Digital Purple Surveillance HDD, 10TB, 7200 RPM Class, SATA 6 Gb/s, 256 MB Cache, 3.5" from Amazon yesterday. It is now installed, initialized as a GPT drive and being written-to by my BlueIris security S/W. So my HDD overall storage configuration is:
C: 256GB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD
2TB 7200 rpm 3.5" SATA HDD
E: DVD RW Drive
F: 10TB 7200 rpm 3.5" SATA HDD

So yes it is quite possible to install (2) 3.5" HDD's in the XPS 8940.

Thank you for letting us know.

bbdude,

I want to do the same thing.  But I could not find the additional sata-power cable  or the data cable inside 8940.  How did you manage. Pl. explain.  I already got a HDD from amazon.  I have some extra screws. Thanks.

BISW2000

@the bbdude 

I just ordered the 8940 and am waiting for it to arrive in the mail.  It is coming with a 512 SSD for the OS, and a 3.5 1TB 3.5 SATA HDD.  I plan to remove the 1TB 3.5 SATA HDD and install two WB Black 8TB 3.5 SATA HDD.  I was so glad to see your thread here stating that you has successfully installing a second 3.5 SATA HDD.  

What I would like to know is if you needed to buy an extra cable to accommodate the second 3.5 SATA HDD?  And if so which one did you purchase?  Lastly , what else did you have to produce/purchase to complete the install, i.e. screws, etc?

I want to be able to purchase everything before the PC arrives so I can have everything ready to upgrade it right away.

Greetings, Tarak Abu

Sorry for the delayed response. I would recommend you to contact our sales experts who should be able to check for product compatibility and availability.

Thanks,

Sahana

@the bbdude 

Thanks for the quick reply.  So all I will have to do is get screws, that easy enough.

Another question if you don't mind.  Why did you go with the WD Purple?  I ask because I am looking at getting the WD Black instead and was wondering if there were any technical pro/cons with one over the other.  And also, other then HDD additions have you done any other modifications?  I was thinking of adding a fan on the inside behind the front of the chassis to assist in pulling air in.  BTW, I ordered my 8940 with i9 10900, I am installing 128GB of Crucial Battistix RAM, a 500GB Samsung 980 Pro SSD for the OS, and two 8 TB WD Black in RAID 1, and lastly it is coming with the new Nvidia RTX 3070.

The Western Digital Purple series HDD's are for 24/7 Surveillance, ie they can be written-to continuously and can withstand higher temperatures in a PC that is always turned on and operating.

The only other modification I made to my XPS8940 was to add an Ethernet NIC card (Rosewill RC-20001 2.5GBASE-T PCIe Network Adapter 2.5Gbps PCIe card). This allowed me to create a separate isolated LAN for my IP Surveillance cameras.

I added a second 3.5" HDD to the top bay, below the optical drive.  You will need 4x #6 (size) -32 (threads per inch) x 1/4" long screws and a SATA power cable (I tapped into the second power cable at the 2.5" bay) and a SATA data cable to connect the HDD to the open SATA port on the motherboard (near the RAM slots).  My first SATA cable (Cable Matters from Amazon) stuck out too far and I could not close the case.  Found another cable more like what dell uses, it is smaller and everything fits.  The photo shows the drive installed.  Note how the red data cable sticks out too far.

@BigRocks2006 

Thanks for the details.  I am still awaiting for my XPS 8940 to arrive.  Can't wait to crack it open to swap the existing HDD and add the second HDD as well as the RAM.

I just ordered a XPS 8940 with a 256GB Solid State Drive and a 2TB Hard Drive.  I plan to add a 2nd 3.5" Hard Drive after I receive it.  My question is .... is there a limit to the size of the Hard Drive I can add?  I was hoping to add a 6TB or 8TB secondary Hard Drive (for movies and pictures).

@Alphonso2021 

I successfully added two WD 10TB HDD in RAID1.

@the bbdude  The two 3.5" HDD cages are identical, only rotated.  I moved my HDD from one position to the other in its cage.

@Tarak Abu Adam  Just be careful with the Crucial Ballistix memory.  Dell doesn't allow XPS profiles for memory, so you will only be able to run it at its SPD profile, which is likely to be 2400 MHz, rather than the 2933 MHz of the installed  memory.

@Jon-62 

Via Task Manager, Windows reports a memory speed of 2666 MHz.