What is the point of this request? We all have different apps loading upon boot, different hardware, different everything. My 2015 MBP has extremely low memory pressure and low utilization. The OS seems pretty responsive, but it is hard to compare to Yosemite because most of the apps I use are buggy. Mail has crashed on me more than once. I have been having several issues with Safari requiring many quit/relaunches. And don't even get me started on third-party apps. So, nobody can really answer your questions since there are so many variables.
hey, at least thats an honest response.
the reason for my request is to try and figure out if I will be ugprading my 2011 MBA to El Capitan, or having to leave it on Yosemite.
No fault of anyones but my own, I was cheap when I bought it and only purchased the 2gb RAM model. So the amount of ram the system uses is a critical bit of information I need to determine if it is worth it for me.
For Example, Lion / Mountain lion on fresh install, will use approximately. 1.5GB of actual ram, leaving enough for basic uses.
Mavericks used about 2.1GB on fresh install, making the system nearly unusable.
Yosemite is a bit better, running around 1.8GB.
if El-Capitan is around the same, or better, than I'll upgrade, but if they go back over 2GB for base RAM usage, I'll have to avoid it.
and yes, these numbers do not reflect "caching" and are actual real RAM usage numbers