I think we _are_ living in memory constrained spaces on the desktop. For some time now I have found the impetus for upgrading to a new computer has been to gain more RAM. More RAM usually requires changing RAM/DIMM type which necessitates new Motherboard and therefore new CPU. It has been that way since I had a 8 Meg machine.
It boggles me that a machine that could hold six hundred uncompressed 1080p video frames is my most memory constrained computer.
For what it's worth, I've had the opposite experience throughout my life. I've never actually upgraded to the physical/motherboard memory limits before I end up buying a new motherboard anyway when changing CPU sockets.
I agree. When I was at university, I bought a top-of-the-line Macbook. Not even a year later, I couldn't even run Eclipse and Firefox at the same time without swapping. Any time I needed to switch from Eclipse to Firefox or vice versa, I wound up waiting a noticeable length of time while the system was busy paging one out of RAM and the other in.
It boggles me that a machine that could hold six hundred uncompressed 1080p video frames is my most memory constrained computer.