I don't doubt that some of the information on that drive came from Hunter Biden. But it doesn't mean that the data wasn't fabricated and added to the image. Has a computer forensics engineer examined it?
IIRC, yes. Multiple examiners were reported, I think. The result, with a bit of larger context added, can be pretty well summed up as I described earlier when I said -
As for altered, on the other hand - at last check, the current state of things was that some specific things on it have indeed been verified, but not any of the potentially more problematic stuff and that, given the evidence at hand about multiple rounds of later alterations in at least some files, it's impossible to validly claim that the laptop is unaltered. Rather, it seems far more true to say that the extent of alteration is largely unverifiable.
To add a bit more detail there to that, IIRC, in short, the chain of custody is difficult to verify and likely involved people with distinctly political motivations and the evidence shows that it was definitely accessed and altered to some degree at multiple points long after it left Hunter Biden's care, though the specifics may or may not have meaningfully changed things beyond trying to gather up presumably... useful things to use as attempted dirt. The conclusion of the examiners was that the full extent of any potential alteration was unverifiable, just that some alterations could indeed be verified.
No actual dirt on Joe, though.
A bit separately, the NY Post and allies coverage was a bit eye-rolling. The "Most news outlets ignored the laptop’s contents until recently." for example? It wasn't that it was ignored! A bunch reached out to try to at least have some actual verification that such even existed and were flatly refused by the clown show! It was blocked on Twitter, etc? Yeah, for a short time, as Twitter tried to verify whether hacked materials were involved, per then standing policy. A lot of people suggested that it was likely Russian disinformation? Based on the actually available information, at the time the observation was certainly made by a number of respectable figures that it would fit the Russian M.O. quite well, but that no definitive conclusions could truly be reached without actual examination. Entirely reasonable, really, and exactly the kind of thing that could be solved by allowing examination. Examination that, once again, was being blocked for seemingly no good reason provided that some there was actually there. All that "We were right, you biased oppressors who mocked us" resentment can pretty safely be turned right back at the NY Post and co because the lack of acceptance and mockery was completely the result of them being friggin' idiots. "We've got this super political slamdunk and we won't let anyone else even verify that it truly exists!" just isn't that convincing when one regularly pushes inane politically motivated lies anyways.
