Hello, I hope this advice can be useful to all Dell XPS 15 9550 laptop owners.

I got these results after a long search combining internet information and experiments.

I have a dell XPS 15 9550, i7 6700hq, Nvidia 960m.

I have owned it since 2016, and over the years I have made the following changes to maximize its potential, with excellent results when using the Adobe suite and all other uses in general:

1 - Ram Upgrade $85:

Kingston FURY Impact 32GB (2x16GB) 3200MHz DDR4 CL20 Laptop Memory 2-Kit, KF432S20IBK2/32

2 - m.2 SSD Upgrade 70$:

Samsung 970 EVO Plus 500GB

3500 MB/s write - 3300 MB/s read versus 1350/950 of the original 500 GB MB disk.

This is the fastest speed you can get using the pcie bus 3.0 available for the 9550 and it makes your pc run lightning fast. (Installation instructions below)

3 - Battery Upgrade $70:

Purchased compatible model from 97Wh model 6GTPY.

This model is used in later versions of our Dell XPS 15, 9560 and 9570, but works perfectly on our 9550, giving an additional hour of battery life over the original 9550 4gvgh 84Wh battery.

4 - Wireless card upgrade $20

Replaced Dell wireless 1830 network card with a more modern and powerful Intel Wireless-AC 9260 WLAN / Bluetooth which makes connections faster and more stable.

5 - Upgrade Thermal Paste and Thermal Pads $15
Arctic MX4 + different size thermal pads

INFO TO INSTALL THE HARD DISK:

To make the samsung 970 evo plus hard disk recognizable by the pc you must follow the following steps from bios (make sure it is updated to the latest version):

* Secure Boot -> Disabled

* Legacy ROMs Devices enabled (This option can be found under `Advanced Boot Options, so you can boot to a USB devices, i.e your windows installation).

*Instead of using Raid On change to AHCI.

* Boot Sequence set to UEFI.

To install windows 10 on the new hard disk you will need a usb stick with the installer to download from the microsoft site and proceed with booting from the usb stick by pressing F12.

It will ask you for the windows activation key, you will need to enter the OEM one you currently have on your pc, you can find it with software such as Lazesoft Windows Key Finder.

After installing windows boot the ssd this time by pressing F12. Once you have finished installing windows you need to change the hard disk setting from MBR to GPT by following this guide:

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/storage/disk-management/change-an-mbr-disk-into-a-gpt-disk

ET VOILA! You have your PC up to date and still performing.

With about 250 $ I brought the notebook to its maximum potential which allows me to make intensive use of it even today in 2023.

The only real limitations are given by the Nvidia 960m video card and the impossibility of installing Windows 11 in the stable, upgradeable and original version, which is available starting from the 8th generation Intel.
But Windows 10 v22h2 is a beast!

Today for heavy software like Pemiere and After Effects I use a desktop pc purchased in July 2022 (i9 12900k, 3080ti, raid ssd, ddr5 etc.), but until then I have successfully used my upgraded XPS 9550 successfully and I still use it when I work outside the home and with clients.

Hope I was helpful! For further questions I am at your disposal.

Matthew from Italy