It was definitely the norm, but it seemed to have more to do with hardware and drivers and certain programs, so people's experiences varied dramatically.

Sounds like you just happened to luck into reliable hardware with well-written drivers.

For me, something about using CorelDraw with my video card led it to crash probably about once every twenty minutes of use.

On the other hand, if I just stuck to working in Word and wasn't trying to simultaneously play MP3's while also downloading files, I'd be fine.