> Past results are not an indication of future performance.
Yes. Sun setting and rising tomorrow like it did today is not given either, despite it having doing so without an error every single day for the past 4 billion years.
I have been buying computers myself for over 30 years and before that my parents bought my first two computers in 1986 and 1992 (an Apple //e and then a Mac LCII).
I’ve seen RAM and hard drive spikes plenty of times.
Do you really think the cost of compute is not ever going down? BTW, my second computer was $4000 in 1992 for the full setup - Mac LC II with 10 MB RAM (actually 12 with 10 usable), monitor, Apple //e card, 5-1/4 inch drive for the card, laser printer and SoftPC. Thats over $9000 in today’s dollars.
I made more than that on a three week consulting contract I did when I was between jobs. I wouldn’t hesitate to spend around $8000 on equipment if I went independent.
Past results are not an indication of future performance. Also funny to say this when hardware costs have spiked.