If you have a large monitor and/or use a very high resolution and have determined that virtual desktops are not for you, a tool you might want to look at instead in order take advantage of all your screen space is Acer Gridvista.

This free utility is pretty clever as it allows you create dockable sections on your desktop. From the description:

Acer Gridvista devides your screen into two, three or four sections in which you can drag & drop windows.
The windows will then be automatically resized. You can also set a window to be always on top or semi-transparent.

If I had a larger monitor I could definitely see myself using this application to dock my most commonly used applications. While you could resize everything manually and minimize/restore as needed, the docking spaces would make this process fast and efficient.