@RRP- Funny, I was about to jump in this AM and said "Let me see if I hear anything from Ron."  So I read a few more mixed bag reviews and decided to wait.  Then along comes your post.  With that time-line it is definitely a weekend project so I will give it a run Sunday.  
Thanks for the push-

@RRP- thanks for the insights.  Like you I do not push the tech envelope.  But I will go with the update and Sunday seems like a good time.  I hope some Apple power users will provide further enlightenment.

El Capitan eats RAM I had to upgrade my MacBook Pro from 4GB to 16GB of RAM now works great. I had a major slo down with Yosemite and only stumbled upon the upgrade of RAM-the upgrade is easily DIY for the tech challenged.

Seems like every upgrade comes with a few screwups. Like the recent iOS upgrade that omitted contacts from search results. The next minor update fixed it. 

Ive heard mixed reviews of El Capitan and haven't bothered trying it yet. 

This was my first upgrade in at least 4 years. There are enough minor things that have been moved around, and a few features removed and added that I am still fumbling often enough.

I see that secure trash removal is no longer a Finder option. I've read that the feature was removed because the solid state memory in the new fusion drives could wear out too quickly. But I'm not using one of those, so I don't like not having the option. I could do it from the terminal, a'la old school. Might be worth keeping that practice up.

Also seems like the system is not quite going to sleep. I keep hearing some sort of drive activity in the background.

The semi-transparent menu pains are often harder to read if they happen to open over a contrast-y desktop image

But I am impressed w. over all performance.  Often a number of operations happen much faster than in  previous versions.

I find it much snappier on my two year old Air. No issues...at least now that Office and El Cap are playing well again. 

4Runner said:

indexing for me was in the background.  I'm not including the download.  I'm just talking the upgrade process making my machine unavailable.   30 minutes and up and running.

@RRP - how much RAM do you have?  El C doesn't need more than Mavericks....2GB is the min but really would want 4 or more.  I'm have 16.

@CPARKTX - I agree.  My 2010 Mac is much snappier.  

After the download, there was a 45 minute install estimate, but the real time ended at a little over an hour. The subsequent indexing was in the background, but it soaked resources such that I thought something was seriously wrong 'til I figured out what was happening.

I have 2 memory slots still open, so I might bump the RAM up, but a new machine w. Retina display and Thunderbolt connection are really enticing.

RRP said:

bi11fish said:

El Capitan eats RAM I had to upgrade my MacBook Pro from 4GB to 16GB of RAM now works great. I had a major slo down with Yosemite and only stumbled upon the upgrade of RAM-the upgrade is easily DIY for the tech challenged.

Mind telling me more about the upgrade?

El Capitan is no more of a RAM hog than Yosemite. OS X redid memory management when they introduced RAM compression back in OS X Mavericks.

If you are experiencing RAM problems in El Capitan it is probably due to some non-Apple software processes. Some software will need to be tweaked to run better under El Cap so some issues will likely be fixed as third party apps get patched over time.

El Capitan's minimum RAM requirement is only 2gb but Apple hasn't sold any computer with less than 4gb for years. However, more RAM is always better and if one is running a Mac with only 4gb but it can be upgraded to more then that is money that is likely well spent.

It all really just depends on how you use your computer. If you usually just have one or two apps open at a time there may not be much advantage to maxing out your RAM.

My iMac has 32 gb of RAM and I run a dozen apps at a time. My MacBook Air only has 4gb so I don't usually run it so hard because of that difference.

Some apps - I'm talking about you Chrome!!! - are notorious memory hogs if you run them "wide open". In the case of Chrome if you're prone to having a dozen windows with a dozen tabs in each Chrome will suck up all the RAM it can.

@RRP - if I recall you said you have an iMac yes? Upgrading the RAM on those is very easy.

Go here: http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/apple/memory/iMac

That page will help you find what upgrades are available for your particular model and there are links to some videos near the bottom of the page that show how to upgrade the RAM. Upgrading the RAM only take a few minutes.

I upgraded by 2013 MBP and my 2013 iMac at work without issue.  I'd been waiting to see if the issues with El Cap and Microsoft Office 2016 had been resolved by the latest patches (and they do seem to be.)  One minor annoyance- on the laptop, the upgrade created a new calendar, "Found In Mail" that Fantasical adopted as the default.  That calendar doesn't sync with google or my phone, so I wasn't seeing appointments created on my laptop for a few days until I figured it out.

So in my low-level techno-geek assimilation of the above I guess I am fairly assured of success once I jump in.  But like the cow or the pig, tech always wins.