Perry Smith <pedzsan@gmail.com> writes:
> I have the belief that byte compiling only helps with loading files
> and that once they are loaded, the code will execute at the same
> speed.
>
> Is that correct?

No.  Check (info "(elisp)Byte Compilation").

> Byte compiling all my personal files is a bit awkward for a couple of
> reasons.  I considering not doing it any more but wanted to know all
> the tradeoffs

Give it a try.  Your code executes faster and the compiler warnings are
useful in most cases.

You can implement automatic byte compilation by customising
load-source-file-function.  Here is my auto-compile implementation.