1st Gen Quad i7 & 16GB RAM (Always Work?)

I tried putting in 16GB (2x 8GB) on my M17x R2 (1st gen Quad i7) and it worked just fine despite the fact that only 8GB was officially offered.

I understand that some memory controller is actually on the Intel chip. So does this mean that all Quad i7 supporting laptops like E6410 should support 16GB?

Yeah there is possible "motherboard" limit by Dell. I tried to Google specially if quad i7 allowed the support but couldn't find a definite answer.

 

What CPU are you using? You can check on ark.intel.com and it will tell you the max memory supported. Example: ARK | Intel® Core

It's possible that a BIOS issue would prevent you from booting up an unsupported (by the computer manufacturer) memory configuration. For example, I had an older Dell Inspiron that only shipped with 4GB of memory (2+2), though the CPU and chipset supported 8GB. Said Inspiron would boot with 6GB (2+4) but would hang during POST with 8GB (4+4). I don't see why something like this wouldn't be possible with any laptop that you are pushing beyond the recommended memory limit.

But, it might work just fine. You'll just have to try it case-by-case.

 

It is it 820QM. ARK says only up to 8GB, but like I said, 16GB worked on M17x. There was some bios recognizing issue if I remember correctly, but worked perfectly fine.

I am trying to figure if anyone has experience similar.

 

I have yet to see problems with a 4x4 config on a clarksfield core i 7, I have seen some laptops not liking a 2x8 config though, the XPS 1640 for example.