HP may trump Dell with a 24-hour battery-powered EliteBook

Tired of watching your laptop batteries conk out after two hours, even though the brochure promised four? Next month, HP expects to ship an EliteBook 6930p notebook that promises a phenomenal 24 hours of battery life without recharging.

Only about a month after Dell's rollout of Latitude notebooks with 19 hours of battery life, Hewlett-Packard has announced plans to ship its own high-end business laptop -- the EliteBook 6390p -- complete with a high capacity battery option able to deliver a full day of battery operation, without recharging.

First announced earlier this year along with more than a dozen other HP notebooks, the new EliteBook also boasts options that include solid-state drives (SSDs) from Intel and a mercury-free 14.1-inch IllumiLite LED screen. HP waited until this week, though, to announce the 24-hour battery life feat.

HP credits the machine's other components for helping to supply an entire day of battery use. The Intel SSDs, for instance, bring up to a 7% battery life increase over traditional hard drives. The IllumiLite boosts battery life a full four hours over conventional displays, officials said in a statement.

HP also touts Intel's X25-M and X18-M SATA SSD options -- slated for availability, too, in October -- with delivering data transfer rates nearly six times faster than those of HDs.

The EliteBook 6930p will weigh in at an astonishing 4.7 pounds, though conceivably, the high-capacity battery may bring it back to a weight on a par with the average notebook. HP has not specified the material it's using for its high capacity battery, nor has it revealed its own weight separately. BetaNews is pressing HP for more information.

The 6930p won't be so easy on the wallet. Although it is being sold for several hundred dollars in discounts through Web retailers such as OnSale.com and GloriaOne.com, the new EliteBook starts at $1,899 on HP's site, without either the high-capacity battery or other high-end options.