
In this method, the main thing to note is you are not installing download El Capitan OS X on your current startup volume, which is what the next method is all about. You will be simply required to install the new OS X into an empty volume or a volume that contains data that you are okay with erasing. Once the backup has been created and tested fully, we can move forward with the clean installation for El Capitan OS X.

Depending on your need you can either use one or both methods to back up your Mac before you upgrade your OS to a newer version, which is, of course, download El Capitan OS X in this case. In order to test a time machine backup, you can restore files in different versions to ensure your document's data is recoverable if something bad happens while the upgrade is processing. The difference in a time machine backup is that it keeps your most recent as well as older versions of documents. For a first timer, the benefit of using a clone backup is you get to easily boot your device with an exact copy of your existing drive in case something goes wrong. Your own experience in using Mac devices will help you realize that. You must create a backup of your Mac and then test this backup.

The next thing you need to do is something very important. These finer details mainly depend highly on your current Mac OS X version and your current hardware. Having more memory than 4GB will certainly improve the user experience as the computer will operate faster and smoothly. Likewise, although the recommended hardware requirement is 2 GB RAM and 8 GB of free hard disk space for running El Capitan, speaking from experience it would run a lot smoothly on 4GB memory and if you have 20GB free internal storage space.

Although the above set of Mac devices are compatible with the download El Capitan Upgrade, several features such as Handoff, Air Drop will be limited only to newer models.
