Hadn't really been thinking about selling the machine, but I don't want any personal information going with the machine. Naturally. What is the best way to ensure that all information, including emails, has been completely wiped?
2006-12-12 04:36:56 · 15 answers · asked by emeraldisle2222 5 in Computers & Internet ➔ Hardware ➔ Laptops & Notebooks
removing the harddrive completely is the safest method.
a new drive is cheap,
or you could try this free prog
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/killdisk.html
2006-12-12 04:40:51 · answer #1 · answered by DogmaDeleted 5 · 0⤊ 2⤋
Poppster (above) got it right. Killdisk will write zeroes across the drive so that no information can be retrieved.
http://www.killdisk.com/downloadfree.htm
Regular formatting just destroys are rewrites part of the MBR - the information (documents, pictures, music) is still on the drive, and can be retrieved. Writing 0s from beginning to end blasts the drive, making it impossible to recover any data.
No other method will securely erase your data, not installing another OS, or reformatting, etc.
2006-12-12 04:50:57 · answer #2 · answered by Prakash V 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Tut tut boys and girls, Formatting a hard drive does not remove the information that is on the drive, it simply re-writes the file allocation tables.
The only way to be 100% sure everything is gone (as in, can never ever be retreived no matter how good you are) is to write one's and zero's to each and every track and cluster on the drive.
2006-12-12 09:26:26 · answer #3 · answered by Sentinel T 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Very valid question, since formatting doesn't erase data, just makes the disk available to write over. Try googling "file shredding" or similar, there are programs that WILL destroy data.
Sensible bit of thinking, that. If push comes to shove, I've been known to take a sledgehammer to a drive to destroy it permanently - tho' I doubt you'll want to do that!
2006-12-12 04:45:26 · answer #4 · answered by champer 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The easiest way is to re-format the hard disk and then to re-install the operating system (I assume you use Windows), but that takes time and requires that you have the original Windows disks that you sometimes may not have. Another good option is to "shred" the folders where you have kept confidential files, using one of a variety of different (often free) programs to do this (check www.download.com or www.tucows.com for options). Good luck.
2006-12-12 04:43:13 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Unless you are a computer Expert it is impossible to completely wipe ALL Information. The only other solution is to Literally remove it and smash it up.
2006-12-12 09:48:07 · answer #6 · answered by D G 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
what i did was get myself a file recovery prog and recovered all files and emails that were recoverable and saved to to a folder, then i added all other personal files to the same folder ,when i had all personal items in there, i used a prog called
east-Tec eraser 2006 and permanantly deleted files beyond recovery then i formatted harddrive and used recovery disc to reinstall windows sounds long winded but it works once I had done the work i tried file recovery not 1 single file was recoverable
2006-12-12 06:47:03 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
The only sure way is to put a new hard drive in the computer and keep the old one or destroy it.
2006-12-12 10:33:54 · answer #8 · answered by johndeereman 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Format the hard-drive, then reinstall windows for them (unless they want Linux)
2006-12-12 04:41:19 · answer #9 · answered by demnity 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Use KillDisk, I'd use it rather than Microsoft's reformatting option.
http://www.killdisk.com/
2006-12-12 04:44:01 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋