Update to OS X El Capitan Mid-2010

[JC8]

I really want to update to El Capitan because of all the good reviews it's gotten, but I am not sure if it is worth it, right now I'm running Mavericks and it's pretty good, but El Capitan really seems to have good performance. I have a MacBook Mid-2010 with 4GB RAM. 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo. Any recommendations? please help

 

[tpjets62]

I have a 2010 MBP.....am running a dual boot with 10.9 and 10.11....so far so good, no issues. It ran fine with original HD and 4 GB RAM, tho i did an upgrade to 8GB and a SSD....The SSD made a huge improvement overall...

 

[mattDC5R]

'09 MBP here running 10.11 wonderfully. I have 8GB of ram in it, but only 7200rpm drive, no complaints for me. I'd go with it if I were you.

 

[Fishrrman]

My suggestion:
El Capitan will run on your MacBook, but if you want your overall user experience to feel like "running" instead of "walking", you should replace the existing hard drive with an SSD.

Bumping up the RAM from 4gb to 8gb will also help, but not nearly as much as an SSD.

I'd suggest a Sandisk Plus or Crucial SSD, about 240gb in size.

Visit ifixit.com and search to find a drive replacement guide for your particular MacBook.

Mine was a mid-2010 MacBook Pro 13", and the replacement was "screwdriver-easy".

One more suggestion:
If you get an SSD, also get a 2.5" USB3 external enclosure.
"Prep and test" the new SSD BEFORE you install it into the MacBook.
You can "work out any bugs" this way.

When the drive swap is done, use the enclosure for your old drive.
It could serve as a "bootable external backup" ...