Core 2 Duos might have been more limited than they maybe could have been, but the 2006-2008 era was still very much transitional. DDR2 was still extremely commo

Core 2 Duos might have been more limited than they maybe could have been, but the 2006-2008 era was still very much transitional. DDR2 was still extremely common and you weren't going to find any 4GB modules. The next architecture was Arrandale (the first Core i3/5/7 line) where the max was increased to 8GB and the Sandy Bridge (probably the minimum I'd consider for doing anything with modern applications or a modern OS) supported 16-32GB. If they held anything hostage, they certainly didn't do it for long. I also think it's ridiculous to consider this in a vacuum. The few AMD laptops I could find from the same time frame have the same memory limits.