Setting Up and Using a HP EliteBook 6930p: Long and Boring Edition

What was supposed to be a more sophisticated video of me poking at what a Core 2 Duo and some ATI graphics chip can do turned into me waiting for the hard drive to do what it needed to do. By the time everything had finished setting itself up, I had completely lost focus of what I wanted to do in this video, so if it seems more aimless than usual, there’s your answer.

This HP EliteBook 6930p isn’t just some old HP business laptop; it’s a brand new… old HP business laptop! Featuring an Intel Core 2 Duo T8300, an ATI Radeon HD 3450 graphics processor, an installation of Windows XP Professional and 4GB of RAM (which you can’t fully use on stock 32-bit XP!), this laptop wouldn’t have been a powerhouse, but it would’ve powered through any business application circa 2008. This laptop would’ve originally shipped with Windows Vista Business, but in the late 2000s, most OEMs offered their business laptops with the option to include Windows XP instead. Whatever business bought these opted for Windows XP Professional over Windows Vista Business, despite the Vista product key on the bottom.

This laptop is a mishmash of surprisingly solid and surprisingly mediocre. Crappy late 2000s LCDs and mushy trackpad buttons meet a really nice keyboard and a solid chassis feel. In other words, it’s like a ThinkPad of the era without the crappy outside rubber coating! Sooner or later I’ll return to this laptop with more to do and with more of a focus, but for now, enjoy me haphazardly setting up an old laptop for 40 minutes.