Ram Upgrade Aspire 5 A515-56-77J7

JSunsurn
JSunsurn Member Posts: 4 New User
I am interested in upgrading my Aspire 5 A515-56-77J7  but cannot find out what the limits are on the Ram Upgrade.  Its currently 12gb, and everything I can find says that 4gb is soldered on so if I open my laptop up there should be a slot with a 8gb stick in it (I assume it is a PC4-25600 DDR4 3200 SO-DIMM, but I cannot find this information without actually opening up my laptop to look at the stick in there currently). I can assume I can upgrade to 16gb, but if I can go higher I will, and need to know the limit my model can handle.  There are variations in the Aspire 5 A515 models that allow for only a 16gb stick inserted but others allow larger. I don't want to buy a stick of RAM that won't work. I am trying to futureproof it... so the max will be good to know. Does anyone have this information?

Best Answers

Answers

  • brummyfan2
    brummyfan2 ACE Posts: 28,457 Trailblazer
    edited March 2022 Answer ✓
    Hi,
    Download and install CPU-z, run it and find out the specs of the 8GB module in the slot available for upgrade, then buy a 16GB module with same specs and install to make the total maximum memory of 20GB.
    https://www.cpuid.com/softwares/cpu-z.html
    https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/47074392
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyU_d25LKYY&t=462s
  • JSunsurn
    JSunsurn Member Posts: 4 New User
    Thank you for this information, though do you have any idea if it could accept a 32gb or larger SO-DIMM?
  • JackE
    JackE ACE Posts: 44,869 Trailblazer
    Answer ✓
    It should take 16gb sodimm 2666MHz or faster for a total of 20GB max, Max buss speed is 2666MHz so dont pay extra for 3200MHz sodimm

    Jack E/NJ

  • StevenGen
    StevenGen ACE Posts: 12,065 Trailblazer
    Answer ✓
    Also and as an addition, use the Crucial System Scanner  that will tell you and suggest the best RAM and SSD's for your laptop. 
  • JSunsurn
    JSunsurn Member Posts: 4 New User
    Okay I wanted to post an update in case anyone is curious.  Because the upgrade surprised me in a good way.

    Everything online seemed to say that of the two types of RAM in the Laptop (Acer Aspire 5 A515-56-77J7) that 4GB was soldered and then the remaining RAM was on a reasonably easy swapable SO-DIMM, which would be 8GB as my model came with a total of 12GB. This particular model I have, this is not the case.  It has 8GB soldered on, and a 4GB easily swapable SO-DIMM.  So when I upgraded my RAM with a 16GB SO-DIMM, which gives me 24GB instead of my expected 20GB.  I am certainly not complaining.

    I also put in a 1TB SSD into the SATA Bay... I thought maybe 2TB would be better but I have a pretty good NAS for Storage, and extra stuff that stays on the Laptop is really only good in times where I am travelling and don't have internet or something (almost never). I wanted it to be a little roomier than the slightly constricted 512GB. 512GB is not bad, just worried about needing more for some reason or another... my former Laptop had a 1TB spinning HDD and I rarely used more than 250GB, but there was the occasional time it did go above that.  250GB is still pretty minimal on 1TB drive, and only half on a 512GB one.  But I still feel constrained with only 512GB.  I could have upgraded the NVMe Drive itself to 1TB or more, by cloning it.. but for the moment I felt leaving it alone for the moment is the better option.  So I have C: NVMe at 512GB (ish... Acer partitions it for recovery purposes) and a D : SSD at 1TB.

    The real only difficulty in the upgrade process for me was trying to open up the base, after removing the screws... you really need a good spudger tool (or whatever you call it) to pop the base off.  The rest of the upgrade process was very simple and didn't take very long.
  • JSunsurn
    JSunsurn Member Posts: 4 New User
    Sorry when discussing my drives the D drive became a emoji.  My bad.