How do I clear my C:drive?

Question

I am getting rid of my old computer, and I want to clear everything on it before I just throw it away. How do I just compleatly clear my Hard drive/C: of everything?

Answer 1

format c:

Answer 2

If you are literally throwing your computer :), then you shall physically damage your hard disk, damage enough, that makes you sure.
If you want to sell out your hard disk, then you can choose any one of the following options:
1. If you want to erase the complete hard disk, run Low level format or Zero-fill error, these both utilities are found in Seagate Disk Manager 9.50 and above, this method will completely erase the data, that can not be recovered, as per my knowledge. This method takes a lot of time, I don’t have any idea that how much.
2. If you want to erase only 1 partition of hard disk, then again you have 2 options:
You can use BCWipe – a software which is used to secure delete files (search “bcwipe” in google for its home page, it’s a freeware). But again, this method may take a lot of time.
OR…, one other possible way can be copying useless files (like MP3s) twice. Copy files, till there is no more space left on the partition, delete the copied files. Repeat this copying process. I will suggest you to use MP3 files for this copying process, because I think, files having a size of 3.5 - 12 MBs can be copied faster than others when talking about bulk data transfers.
Format your partition after running BCWip OR before the copying process.

If you have bought new computer, use it for the process, that will really help in doing the task faster.

Sorry! I couldn’t make the reply any shorter :D

Answer 3

There are two ways
(a) You simply want to clear the hard disk by the format commnad which other s have written, but data can be retrieved from that hard disk using data recovery softwares.
Boot with a WIn98 bootable floppy and at the command prompt, type
format c:\

(b) Erase such that the data cannot be recovered. For this download Eraser whch is a free tool available at "http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=37015&package_id=65323"
and read about it from
"http://www.heidi.ie/eraser/"
Eraser can delete data from your hard disk so that it cannot be recovered. So, delete the data that you donot want someone to recover by Eraser. Once all the relevant data has been deleted, then format your hard disk using the format command as described above.

Answer 4

If you're going to throw it away, it would be easier (and faster) to just physically destroy the drive. If you just reformat it or delete the partition, information can still be recovered from the drive.

You could do a disk wipe, which would eventually overwrite all the data on the drive, however,on large modern hard drives that can take a very long time due to the fact that you have to run several passes.

Answer 5

formatting the C: drive does it..

but the data inside your C: will remain unless you full format it..

because quick format will clear only the File Allocation Table (FAT) of your hard disk..

choose the full format if you want to ensure that all the data will be deleted..Ü

Answer 6

Go to disc properties and choose format disc

Answer 7

Start>Run>Cmd
Type format c: /a

It will delete the whole lot.

Answer 8

start your system by bootable cd and then go to ms dos program
write like this
C:\ format/q/s c:enter

Answer 9

format it using format option

Answer 10

make a new user account and delete the old one...it will delete all the dedicated user files.