The Optane drive is the 128 GB drive. If you disabled the Optane cache and the PC still boots properly, you shouldn't have any problems installing a large SSD in the M.2 slot. If you haven't already done it, you should first change the BIOS SATA Operation setting from RAID to AHCI. You just have to do that the right way: Now install the new SSD and you can clone the HDD onto the new SSD if you don't want to reinstall everything. You can use software like Macrium Reflect (free) or another one of your choice. NOTES: 1. Dell has only validated this PC model with up to a 512 GB NVME SSD. Doesn't mean a larger one won't work, but Dell can't guarantee that it will. So look around this forum to see if anyone has installed a larger SSD in this PC model, if you want something larger than 512 GB. 2. Since your HDD is 1T, if you install a smaller M.2 SSD, you will have to resize the C: partition when you clone all the partitions that are on the HDD onto the new SSD, otherwise everything won't fit on the SSD. Macrium will allow you to reduce the size of the C: partition, but read/follow the instructions carefully. Once the cloning is done, reboot the PC and tap F12 to open the boot menu. Select the option to boot from the SSD. Otherwise, PC will always boot from the HDD. Once you're sure the PC boots via F12 from the new SSD and runs correctly, you can open Disk Management in Win 10 and initialize the HDD (ALL FILES DELETED!). Then reboot normally and PC should now boot directly from the SSD and you can use the HDD (now your D drive) for routine storage. And it's a good idea to configure Win 10 to move default folders onto the HDD to save space on the SSD.
I have an Inspiron 3670 that has the Intel Optane RST installed. I want to upgrade the 128 GB M.2 2280 SSD with a 512 GB M.2 SSD. I have disabled the Optane RST but wasn’t sure with which one of the two drives (128 GB SSD or 1 TB HDD) the Optane RST was associated. Looking at the Disk Drives under Device Manager, should I see some type of notation / identification that the Optane RST is associated with either drive. Is it safe to assume that if there isn’t any identifying information that it would be safe to remove the 128 GB SSD and replace it with the new SSD? I recognize that I will have to do a clean install / setup of Win 10 on to the new SSD. I am just concerned that the Intel Optane RST is stored in the BIOS and even with a new SSD and clean install of Win 10 that if the Optane RST is in the BIOS, it will search for it on the new SSD and never find it, causing a BSOD.
Intel Optane RST - Inspiron 3670