Buyer Says New Delhi Shop Sold a 2022 Core i5 Laptop as a ₹70,000 Core Ultra 5, Using a Startup Script to Fake It

An Indian buyer says he paid ₹70,000 ($750) for what was sold as a new HP Envy 14 x360 with a Core Ultra 5 125H, but got a 2022 laptop with an older Core i5. The older chip had been disguised by a startup script that changed what Windows reported, according to screenshots he has published on Reddit and X. He says he bought the machine from a shop in Delhi’s Nehru Place market that displayed HP “Authorised Store” branding. HP Support told him that the shop “is not an HP-authorized centre”, and that HP “is unable to intervene in or investigate its independent business activities”.

TalkEsport has reviewed the invoice, screenshots and messages the buyer shared, but has not been able to verify them independently. We are not naming the shop, as its account of the sale has not been heard. The buyer says he secured a refund after confronting the seller, but missed the festive sale prices he had planned his purchase around. He is now asking HP to act against shops that use its branding without authorisation.

How the fake Core Ultra 5 laptop was made to look real

According to the buyer’s photos, the laptop came in a box for an HP Envy 14 x360 listing a Core Ultra 5 125H, 16GB of DDR5 memory, a 512GB SSD and a 14-inch OLED screen. The serial number on that box does not match the one printed on the laptop’s chassis, or the one shown in HP’s own UEFI hardware diagnostics. The label on the underside instead identifies the machine as an “HP ENVY x360 2-in-1 Laptop 13-bf0121TU”, a 13-inch model. The invoice he shared also lists a 13.3-inch HP Envy against the chassis serial number, at ₹70,000 including 18% GST.

The processor itself tells exactly the same story. CPU-Z, a free utility that reads the processor’s identity directly from the chip, shows a 12th-generation Intel Core i5-1230U, an Alder Lake part that Intel launched in early 2022. Windows PowerShell, however, reported an “Intel(R) Core(TM) Ultra 5 125H @ 4.50GHz”, while still listing 10 cores and 12 threads. That core count gives the game away, because a genuine Core Ultra 5 125H has 14 cores and 18 threads.

The buyer found the mechanism in Windows Task Scheduler. A task named “WINDOW11” was set to run at every system startup, launching a batch file called silent.bat from the user folder. That file quietly opened a shortcut to a second script, named “ULTRA 5 125H”, which the buyer says rewrote the processor name each time the laptop started. He also found the firmware locked with an administrator BIOS password, which he says stopped him checking the hardware during boot.

Why the registry trick works, and how buyers can spot it

The trick relies on how Windows stores the processor’s name. The text shown on the About page, and returned by many system tools, sits in a registry value called ProcessorNameString, under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINEHARDWAREDESCRIPTIONSystemCentralProcessor. That part of the registry is rebuilt from the hardware every time Windows starts, so a hand-edited name disappears after a reboot. A script that runs at startup, like the one the buyer found, simply puts the fake name back before the user sees it.

That also makes the disguise surprisingly shallow to expose. Tools that ask the chip directly, such as CPU-Z or HWiNFO, show the real model, as do the BIOS setup screen and HP’s built-in hardware diagnostics. The core and thread counts in Task Manager come from the hardware too, so comparing them with Intel’s specification page is a quick check at the counter. Buyers can also enter the chassis serial number into HP’s warranty check, which shows the model registered to that unit, and compare it with the box and the invoice.

A few warning signs need no software at all. A new consumer laptop should not arrive with an administrator BIOS password already set, and the serial number on the box should match the one on the underside of the machine. The buyer also warns that a fresh copy of Windows proves nothing, because a system can be wiped and reinstalled before the box is resealed. Insisting on an invoice that names the exact model and serial number makes any later complaint much easier to pursue.

HP’s response, and a buyer’s options under Indian consumer law

HP’s reply, as shared by the buyer, does not dispute that its branding was on display, but says the store is not authorised and that HP cannot investigate it. It recommends “contacting the store directly for any further assistance or clarification”. HP India had not commented publicly on the case at the time of writing, including on whether it will act over the use of its name and logo at the shop. Checking a brand’s own list of authorised sellers before buying remains the simplest protection against a lookalike shop.

Under India’s Consumer Protection Act, 2019, falsely presenting goods as being of a particular standard or model, or passing off old goods as new, counts as an unfair trade practice. Buyers can register a grievance with the National Consumer Helpline on 1915, or file a case online with the district consumer commission through e-Daakhil. Anyone who believes they have been cheated can also approach the police or report it on the government’s cybercrime portal, or by calling 1930. A printed “Goods once sold not to return back” line, like the one on this invoice, does not stop a consumer commission from hearing a complaint about misrepresented goods.

The timing makes a cheap “deal” on a premium laptop easier to sell. Memory prices have climbed this year as AI data centres absorb supply, a squeeze that drew wide attention when Sam Altman called idle PC memory a waste. Scams aimed at gamers and tech buyers have taken other forms as well, from fake moderators in the Calamity Discord hack to unknown child accounts appearing in PSN family lists. The buyer’s Reddit post had drawn more than 100 upvotes by Tuesday, and he has asked readers to share his X thread so that HP takes the issue up.