Lenovo W541 4940MX upgrade in RAM and SSD

[Kraiger]

I recently bought a Lenovo W541 lpatop with a Intel Core i7-4940MX Processor Extreme Edition and a NVIDIA Quadro K2100M 2G with 4GB PC3-12800 DDR3L SDRAM 1600MHz SODIMM of memory, 500GB Hard Disk Drive, 7200rpm, 2.5 and 16GB M.2 Solid State Drive Double.

I am looking to upgrade the memory and populate the 4 slots to 32GB. Also looking to upgrade the Hard Drive to an SSD drive.

I use this to run multiple VMs and Emulators for both work and studying for my CCNA.

What kind of memory and SSD drive would you suggest, that would enhance the performance and utilize this type of processor to use it at it's potential when needed?

Thanks

 

[viveknayyar007]

Hello Kraiger

Your laptop has 4GB PC3-12800 DDR3L SDRAM 1600MHz SODIMM RAM and can support up to 32GB. Since programs like VMware and other Cisco emulators like GNS consume heavy amount of RAM even if you have configured Idle PC, it is recommend to get the maximum supported RAM in order get a flawless learning experience.

A dedicated thread posted by one of the Tom's Hardware members asking about the best RAM is here. You can refer to this post and its comments to see which RAM is best for you.

Also, a dedicated thread containing a comparison chart of the best SSDs available is here.

Hope this helps.

Good Luck!!

 

[hang-the-9]

For a workstation laptop I suggest you look at RAM specially designed to be compatible with that model, Lenovo is likely pricy, but sites like Crucial and Kingston will have modules guaranteed to work with your model. The hard drive does not matter that much as to the model, they all will work, but not all RAM may work.

RAM just with the same specs as yours may work fine if you don't want to go for the official supported RAM for your system. The chances of the RAM working are greater than not, but non-gaming laptops can be picky when it comes to RAM.