snippet of HashMap's default implementation, from Sun's JVM (Mac OSX build 1.6.0_24-b07-334-10M3326)

HashMap.java

    /**
     * Applies a supplemental hash function to a given hashCode, which
     * defends against poor quality hash functions.  This is critical
     * because HashMap uses power-of-two length hash tables, that
     * otherwise encounter collisions for hashCodes that do not differ
     * in lower bits. Note: Null keys always map to hash 0, thus index 0.
     */
    static int hash(int h) {
        // This function ensures that hashCodes that differ only by
        // constant multiples at each bit position have a bounded
        // number of collisions (approximately 8 at default load factor).
        h ^= (h >>> 20) ^ (h >>> 12);
        return h ^ (h >>> 7) ^ (h >>> 4);
    }

    /**
     * Returns index for hash code h.
     */
    static int indexFor(int h, int length) {
        return h & (length-1);
    }