Selling a few Pc's. Need to wipe hard drives

Yep.....I got a copy of DBan.....

 

Reformat, put a new fresh copy of operating system on it.

 

Miles, if you want total security a reformat and fresh OS isn't as good as you believe. The data is still on your cpu it is just more fragmented and as such retrievable by somebody who is highly knowledgeable in the area.

That being said I don't believe this kind of wipe is a security threat when you sell a used computer to your average user.

 

I've been using CCleaner. It will do DOD (3 wipes), NSA (7), or Gutmann (35). I have no idea how effective it really is as I haven't inspected any drive after the fact ... I'm just a little paranoid.

If I were getting rid of the HD then I would wipe it before doing a format.

 

Assuming its a pc (windows based machine). Get the windows cd. Slip it into the cd drawer and restart the machine. When the computer restarts it will ask you if you want to restore, repair, or install. Choose install with out save. Come back to the machine in about 45 minutes and it should be emppty by then with just the operating system in it.

 

Loves that is the same (for your basic users) as the format and reinstall. Still leaves the data on the system, you just have to dig for it a little harder

 

When the system deletes the file all it does is place a ? as the first character of the file name. I have retreived many a document by simply putting the correct letter back, if they have not used the drive after the delete.

If you every saw ASCII code for the binary words,, the program will show the matching charactor also. very easy to read.

a good wipe will put all 1's\0's for each binary word ... all 1's then all 0's. , military spec requires this several times. very secure after that.

anything less and the data is still there in the sectors.

but, the most secure I have found is the Hammer...

 

WOW! thanks i never knew that, well i guess that wouldn't work then. It's like driving a truck in the pc world, u learn something new everyday

 

Hell I am from the computer generation and I still learn on a daily about what can be done with these ###### things. The funny thing is while they make many things in life easier, they screw up just as much.

 

Darik's Boot and Nuke is the way to go, Unless You Like Hammers Windows format only mark the drive as ready to write over, It doesn't actually kill the data on the drive. Any $50 recovery software will be able to see data on a Windows formatted drive. DB&N and Good Luck