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Query by deryckza: How do I wipe the drive absolutely distinct just before I throw an outdated laptop or computer away?
I intend to throw an outdated pc away and because of the chance of identification fraud and so on. I want to be positive that the drive is definitely clear prior to I do so. Is it good ample just to go into “Add/eliminate programs” and remove everything or is there a much more thorough way of carrying out it.
Finest solution:
Answer by Ecurb Maharg
Stick a speaker magnet on it.
Know better? Leave your own reply in the comments!
Burn it or smash it dude.
Get a large magnet and move it over the hard drive. This will magnetically erase the data on it!
only sure way is to take the drive out and smash it with hammer.
pour petrol on it and burn it
You can use something like a speaker magnet on the disks (I would crack it open first), or you can just break open that hard drive and keep the disks from the drive. They make neat ornaments on the Christmas tree, and after enough scratches no one could recover the data anyway (I hate throwing out useful stuff, can ya tell?)
Go into DOS and type Format c:
all will be gone
then smash it to pieces just to make sure
break that muthaph*kka !!!
and no more worries
Take a sledge hammer to it because even if you do wipe it clean there are programs out there can bring some of the data back.
you can buy hard drive wiping software that is secure. try here http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=hard+drive+wiping+software&meta=
this should help you choose the right one.
A more thorough way would be to go to the DOS prompt and type
format c:
(Or whatever letter your hard drive is)
This will prevent 99.9% of people accessing your data.
To be 100% sure, take it out and burn it, magnetise it, spray it with acid… snap it up into pieces and put them into separate bins.
take out the hard drive boil it microwave it apply magnets and then smash it with a hammer
Re-format the hard drive – don’t use the windows quick format you want the one thats in the BIOS area or the Windows standard format that came with your windows installation disk. Either one will re-initialise all sectors – and clear the disk. Alternatively a big hammer works quite well!
NO to add/remove; two things I would like to mention.
If the computer is still working I implore to donate it to a school or a charity that refurbishes them and give them to those who can’t afford a system.
There are many Free programs on the net that will wipe your hard drive clean.
But if your determined to throw it away it takes only a couple of minutes to remove the hard drive and smash it with a hammer………even if you decide to smash the hard drive donate the computer without the hard drive. It is still useful and if all that is needed is another hard drive the charities will put one in and give it someone who needs it.
Use fdisk utility and delete the existing partitions. Partition it again differently than the original partitions and format the partitions.
not possible
you need professional software and even then traces remain….I’d drop it in the ocean for a month and then retrieve it and throw it away. (We have a boat slip.)
I would’ve said something but I think you have all the advice you need
just had to ad that these are really funny answers I never knew how much you need to have a hammer lying around
LOL
Best way to ensure NOTHING is recoverable is to take it outside in the rain, open it up and smash everything inside with a hammer – specially when you’re in a bad mood. Or let the kids do it (they’ll destroy EVERYTHING). Then gather all the bits up and dispose of it lawfully by ‘phoning the Council for a special uplift to deal with electronics disposal.
And it’s better fun than taking a magnet to the hard-drive (which also works:)))
But don’t bother deleting things manually – that’s too much hassle and time consuming.
smash it up with a big hammer, that will defnitely do the job
I recently have to do a whole bunch of PCs
http://www.killdisk.com/ have a free version and a professional version. Depending on how sensitive the data is you can either use the free one or the Pro version.
Hitting with a hammer or tossing in a fire will not work. They have proven this (The fire was hot enough to melt the disk case but they still recovered the data.)
What you have to ask yourself is how much trouble are people doing to be willing to go to get at the data on the disk.
Take the hard drive OUT!
If your throwing your computer away remove the harddrive and destroy it. Otherrwise, you must write over the material on your harddrive. There are programs to do this.
For government classified hard disks (CONFIDENTIAL, SECRET, TOP SECRET) they are destroyed by dismantling the drive and dropping the plate in an acid bath.
However, for your purposes dismantling the drive, it’s only a few screws and physically damaging the plate will suffice as the expense of recovering the data would far outweigh any benefits from ID fraud.
dip it in sulphiric acid….if can’t access it the just get some petrol and burn it!
You meanies!
Take the hard drive out and give the rest of the pc to charity /me.
Find nice indestructible plastic container and insert hard drive. Bury at suitable depth in garden /disused mine/ concrete/ building site as time capsule.
To be absolute… you must pull the hard drive and smash it… burn it etc…
h.c.
Either to a complete reinstall of the factory settings or your safest bet is to smash it up and burn it
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http://www.vision-satellite.co.uk/
within MSDOS there is a program called fdisk. put it on a floppy and run it. partition you hard drive using this program. data cannot be retrived after this.
the standard way in industry is to take the hard drive out and smash it with a hammer that way you can guarantee that no one can check the disk for any thing and as you are throwing it away that is what i would advise you to do other ways would be a full reformat the harddrive and defragging it will overwrite data as well.
delete the library.dat files
fdisk and formatting? nope, you can still get info back off it. for those that dont know, you can defrag and its still possible to get info back! perhaps not all of it, but you can get some.
taking it apart? to much hassle!
what you need is a shredder. you need to shred all your files.
shredder software will over-write all your sectors etc.
if it was me, i’d just take the old drive out, install it in the new machine and then use it as another drive (after reformatting it).
to do that, ask a guru or look on the web for instructions.