Snow leopard to el capitan, will it cause my macbook to be slow?

There is no such thing as a MacBook (late 2015). And, there is no such thing as a MacBook Late 2010.

So, if you can't identify the model of your Mac, it will be hard to give specific advice.

Click on the Apple Menu's, "About This Mac," then System Report, look for the Model Identifier number. You need to have MacBook5,1 or higher and a minimum of 2 Gigs of RAM to be able to run El Capitan.

List of MacBook models:

Also Snow Leopard would not run on a 2015 Mac of any kind. It will run on a Macbook from 2010, which does make sense.

While 2GB is a minimum, it would be better if there was more RAM. 4GB would be better. 8GB would be great. 16GB would be Great!

Many people that complain about performance with the newer OS X releases have 3rd party additions that are not playing nice with the OS. For example, anti-virus packages that you do not need, Mac cleaners that you do not need (and sometimes cause damage), nor memory cleaners to name a few category of 3rd party app that cause performance issues.

If you would care to post the output from EtreCheck, someone will evaluate it and let you know if they see any red flags.

<https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-6174>

The 2 places I’ve seen recommended most to buy reliable RAM are below. I have purchased RAM several times from Other World Computing and have always been very satisfied with the product and service. They have on-line instructions on how to replace the RAM. OWC has also tested RAM above what Apple states is the maximum. I now have 6GB installed on a early 2008 iMac supposedly limited to 4 GB and noticed an improvement.

Crucial

Other World Computing

Check to make sure your applications are compatible. PowerPC applications are no longer supported after 10.6.

Application Compatibility

Applications Compatibility (2)

El Capitan 10.11 Compatibility information

Do a backup before installing, preferable 2 backups on 2 different drives.

Okay, your MacBook7,1 is officially known as a MacBook Mid 2010 in Apple speak.

It can be upgraded to 16 Gigs of RAM. 2 Gigs is the minimum required amount, 4-8 Gigs would be the sweet spot, but 16 Gigs is obtainable for reasonable prices, so why stop at 4-8.

As Eric has pointed out, OWC would be one of the best sources for the RAM and they offer DIY videos for their installation.

http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/memory/Apple_MacBook_MacBook_Pro/Upgrade/DDR3_Whi te

Older PowerPC based apps won't be supported, for most people that means, AppleWorks, Microsoft Office 2004 (or earlier), and Adobe CS2 apps (or earlier).

You should make a full backup of your current drive before proceeding, becuase you can't uninstall an OS X version, and because, if you don't have one, you've been living dangerously. I would recommend backing up to an external drive with a cloning software, i.e., CarbobCopy Cloner or SuperDuper, as this kind of backup is bootable. This means that you could boot from the external drive, unlike a TimeMachine backup.

There were major improvements to OS X, that started with the introduction of Mavericks, with memory management, that in my eyes, make every version of OS X from Mavericks onward, clearly superior to Snow Leopard.

Good luck.

Hi. I have the same issue. Do I install the additional RAM first, or upgrade the OSX?

(My iphone won't sync anymore because I'm using iphone 10.0.2. I'm on a mid 2010 with OS X 10.7.5.)

Have two other Macs with later OS X but the older MacBook Pro is where all my critical admin files are.)

Thanks so much. Don't know what we'd do without people like you. No IT department to run to for help. Just me.

Do I install the additional RAM first, or upgrade the OSX?

You could go either way, but the upgrade process would probably go faster with the higher amount of RAM installed.