Question MBP Upgrade, SSD Vs. RAM

[tenaciousleydead]

Which will net me more performance, I don't typically work on Macs and don't know the behavior of the OS. I'm on a 2011 MBP with 4Gb Ram, Sandy-bridge 2.3Ghz CPU, 320Gb HDD (5400 RPM?). My ram usage is usually 3.5Gb/4Gb, I know El Capitan does on the fly memory compression so I don't think it get's much closer than that. Any ideas? 8Gb DDR3 1333 vs 240Gb SSD, Thanks!

 

[JustSomeJoe]

(from personal experience) El C(r)apitan certainly benefits from 8Gig RAM, but I'd recommend using Activity Monitor during normal/typical use and see what the disk activity/RAM use is before deciding which would be of most benefit.

 

[tenaciousleydead]

How would I deduce that the HDD is causing the potential slow-down? As I said memory pressure usually hovers around 3.5Gb/4. Thanks Joe Also any experience with putting a 7200 RPM HDD in to replace the 5400 one, I would worry a little bit about heat in the chassis and also shortened battery life