Upgrade Old Dell XPS 15 9550 vs Buying New Dell XPS Laptop?

Helmut said:

You are vastly overthinking this, it is a good spec and only 3½ years old:

RAM 8 GB - put in 16 GB, that will last you.

SSD/HDD - put in 1 TB drive, that will last you. Obviously choose a well known SSD brand like Samsung, Crucial, WD. It is up to you whether you pay a bit extra for a Samsung drive.

None of those will have much noticable performance increase, it is just that they should last for a good few more years.

It is better to have a too large SSD/HDD even if half is never much used. You would quite quickly fill up a 512 GB drive in future years, a false economy.
If your Laptop never leaves the desk why bother with a new battery. This cost would apply even with a new laptop.

Hey. Yea I think the laptop I have is still good. Yea the ram increase I will do. I wanted to do that years ago... never did it. The ssd... yea I figure 1tb is better because I don't want the same situation like right now happening. Again years ago I would never thought my ssd would be almost used up... right now its 18gb free of 232gb. The hard drive bar is now red instead of blue. So does that mean say i have 5gb free of 232gb... it would slow and have issues? With 1tb, i won't have to think about this for a long time right? With 500gb, i don't want an issue a bit later on. Back then i rarely even used up 100gb of it.. but since i been using this for so long, well it adds up especially with those windows 10 updates.



With the ssd brand, should i just pay the premium price for the samsung ssd with the link posted? That seem to be the best one? Crucial i read some ppl say aren't good... and WD... i see some very good reviews but others says they got defected ssd. Thing is for some reason i feel samsung is reliable... the sata 2.5 inch samsung i am using now is still working good... and i bought this back in 2013.



I use my laptop almost 100% connected to my 2 external monitors plugged in and plugged into outlet. The issue is beside the battery being worn out 92%... the trackpad is raised up. If you google about this on dell xps 15 9550... that is battery swelling that causes the trackpad to raise up. I never even noticed this until weeks ago since i rarely use the trackpad... i connected a wired keyboard to it. So the battery... i have to get a new one because my battery is swelled. And since my hard drive is low in space... i figure well since i have to replace the ssd... might as well get the bigger 84wh/97wh battery as oppose to the 56wh one i have now and get a 1tb m.2 ssd. You agree with this right?

Okay so I pretty much decided I will most likely just buy the parts, battery, 1tb m.2 ssd and upgrade ram to 16gb.


Anyone here have their opinion? I just don't want to spend $1680 for a new laptop if buying the 3 parts would total $385 and having it installed at a repair shop would cost at most $150-$200. I mean, if you were to bring a laptop to your local computer shop and have them take out the ram and put in new ram, and battery and ssd... how much would each job cost about individually? The only thing i could see where they charge a lot would be say you want to have them clone your drive which would cost at least $100+ right?


I also think I will try to open up the laptop myself and replace the parts myself while looking at instructions and watching video on youtube for it... do you all suggest this or not? Again I never opened a laptop ever because I don't want to risk damaging it etc.

paulyjustin said:

I also think I will try to open up the laptop myself and replace the parts myself while looking at instructions and watching video on youtube for it... do you all suggest this or not? Again I never opened a laptop ever because I don't want to risk damaging it etc.

Definitely not. That won't lead to anything productive.

About the only thing you can do IF POSSIBLE is to get more than 1 repair shop to give you a diagnosis and a quote for the entire job.

If that's not possible, then just go with that one repair shop.

It isn't complicated.

Your main decision should be replace parts or buy a new laptop.

You have decided to replace the parts, so go ahead. More "analysis" or questions isn't going to help.

It's up to the shop to examine the laptop and give you an accurate diagnosis.

There's no way we can do that from thousands of miles away, sight unseen.

It doesn't matter what a repair shop here would charge. We can't even give you an accurate diagnosis, let alone a reasonable price.

You have to deal with your repair shop's quote wherever you are located. If you can't get a second quote, then you have to accept it.

As usual, do what you want.

Three years ago I built a desktop computer with a Samsung 960 EVO 500B M.2 NVMe SSD. I really needed something bigger but the high cost of the Samsung SSD limited what I could buy. I learned my lesson and replaced it with an ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD. Adata is much less known than Samsung but the drive I got has had very good reviews. It was also almost $100 cheaper than a Samsung SSD.

I also learned a lesson with my laptop. It came with a 256GB M.2 SATA SSD. A year after I bought it I upgraded the drive to an ADATA SU800 512GB M.2 SATA SSD, Within 6 months I regretted the size I bought and upgraded it again to a ADATA SU800 1TB M.2 SATA SSD,

I can't tell you what you should buy because only you can decide what your needs are. I can only say that if saving money is important then look at other brands than Samsung because there are other brands that are still good but a lot less money. Since you have to pay someone else for the labor then go for the larger 1TB SSD rather than the 500GB one. The extra cost will be well worth it.

MisterEd said:

Three years ago I built a desktop computer with a Samsung 960 EVO 500B M.2 NVMe SSD. I really needed something bigger but the high cost of the Samsung SSD limited what I could buy. I learned my lesson and replaced it with an ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD. Adata is much less known than Samsung but the drive I got has had very good reviews. It was also almost $100 cheaper than a Samsung SSD.

I also learned a lesson with my laptop. It came with a 256GB M.2 SATA SSD. A year after I bought it I upgraded the drive to an ADATA SU800 512GB M.2 SATA SSD, Within 6 months I regretted the size I bought and upgraded it again to a ADATA SU800 1TB M.2 SATA SSD,

I can't tell you what you should buy because only you can decide what your needs are. I can only say that if saving money is important then look at other brands than Samsung because there are other brands that are still good but a lot less money. Since you have to pay someone else for the labor then go for the larger 1TB SSD rather than the 500GB one. The extra cost will be well worth it.

Thats what i figure... just get the biggest ssd you can get. Again years ago...i never thought i would ever needed a 500gb ssd.


Also one other thing to confirm here. I am planning to get 4k monitor... a 43 inch tv. Will my video card graphics card support it? I know i will have to put one of those hdmi to hdmi two.0 cables to connect it.

paulyjustin said:

Thats what i figure... just get the biggest ssd you can get. Again years ago...i never thought i would ever needed a 500gb ssd.


Also one other thing to confirm here. I am planning to get [FONT="]4k monitor... a [/FONT][FONT="]4[/FONT][FONT="]3 inch tv. Will my video card graphics card support it? I know i will have to put one of those hdmi to hdmi two.0 cables to connect it.[/FONT]

I believe the answer has not changed since this thread: 4k Monitor Recommendations?

The laptop's HDMI port is 1.4, which means that it can only do 3840 X 2160 at 30 Hz. You may not want that.

You may do better with a Thunderbolt to HDMI adapter, but I have never used one. Make sure that it supports 4k at 60 Hz.

Is this what I need exactly?

https://www.amazon.com/Adapter-QGeeM...0489558&sr=8-5




I do have this one though


https://www.amazon.com.mx/gp/product...?ie=UTF8&psc=1

paulyjustin said:

Is this what I need exactly?

https://www.amazon.com/Adapter-QGeeM...0489558&sr=8-5




I do have this one though


Server Busy

The first one isn't what you want, unless you'd be happy with 30Hz refresh.

The second looks more interesting, but I'm unsure about compatibility.

Hey all. Im ordering everything on amazon tomorrow.


So upgrading ram to 16gb... there is zero purpose of upgrading to 32gb right?


Now if i upgrade to 16gb, i know i can always upgrade to 32gb in the future. I could always sell the 16gb ram on ebay right?


Also ppl suggested i get the sk hynix 1tb m.2 nvme instead because it uses a lot less power. I read reviews on it and it seem good. They say im overpaying for the samsung 970 evo nvme ssd since its cheaper than the samsung and much better in power consumption.


But then someone says it lacks SED co processor for full disk encryption. I use bitlocker and thus i have to put in a pin/password everytime i turn on my laptop. So the hynix won't work for this?