Huh. Well, if the poster meant i3-1215U, then yes. Without the "U", I interpreted it as a Westmere-generation part. However, it looks like those are all just 3-digit model numbers and Sandybridge went straight to the 2000's series. So, maybe there never were 1000-series parts.
Airports, coffee shops, but even around the home or office - people will flee from noise or seek more privacy, often leaving their A/C plug behind. It's not too uncommon that someone in one of my calls or meetings will have to go and get their charger or move to where they can plug in, due to low battery.
Executives who do a lot of work-related travel don't really have an option but to join work calls on the go. It's not as if they don't at least use headphones.
Video calls aren't always work-related, either. Did you never video conference with friends or family members? People can even do remote doctor visits.
Not all professionals have the same needs. At my job, they have different machine specs for different types of jobs. The "field laptop" spec is fine for doing video conferencing, email, MS Office, web, etc. but you wouldn't want to do heavy-duty development on it.
If we're talking Windows, then I'd agree that 8 GB isn't a good choice for that, especially with all the security software they load onto these machines.
At my job, we never upgrade laptops. They're leased for 3 years, and then you get a new one. If guess, if your needs exceeded your current spec, then you'd turn it in early and either get a refresh or move up a tier.
As far as I know, there indeed never was a Core 1000 series of chips; as you said, the first Core generation had 3-digit numbers, then it went straight to Core 2000 with the second. In any case, since the poster said they bought two last January, I honestly didn't even consider that generation; I sure hope there are none of them on the market today anymore! Especially not in new machines...
But yeah, I have seen that chip on websites like notebookcheck fairly recently while researching the 5700U in my mini. They are somewhat comparable and the i3 popped up in the comparisons a couple times. So I was already familiar with the CPU in question.
Eh, airports usually have access to the regular power network. Flew to London and back just three weeks ago, both Heathrow and Fraport have easy access and often even business lounges for more privacy. Coffee shops, maybe, but I wouldn't want to do a voice call there. It doesn't matter if you wear headphones, btw; the stuff you say can give away quite a lot, too, even if you are careful.
I sometimes video call with friends, yes, but always either at home, or when I'm at my parent's. Again, I value privacy so I don't do any unnecessary calls. Besides, my phone is always with me; we talk via Discord normally, so it's no problem to use it on my phone. Maybe WhatsApp in rare cases. Never had a voice or video call with my family, that's phone only. Also, am I really so pampered by my workplace and home with power sockets readily available anywhere? xD
No idea if that's different in the US, but where I live there really is no need to sit someplace without a socket.
And yes, people have different needs, correct. But why the heck does your workplace give you a $1600 machine when all you do is office and video calls? A regular laptop would do. And that is kinda my point. With a chip like that, I would expect you do fairly heavy workloads; which you can't do because of the lacking RAM. My problem simply is that I don't see who would ever need this thing when a cheaper option would suffice. And let's say the company in question has a contract with Apple or really like the Apple esthetic that much, well, they, too, have cheaper options that would be more than enough for the workload. Even with things like amortization and possibly tax magic considered, it just doesn't feel like an economical or sensible option to me...
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