Hutch

If you want to put the data on the drive beyond the realms of partition and data recovery tools then simply formatting it, is no better than manually deleting the files. You need to use something like Active KillDisk, when you absolutely, positively need to kill every mother****ing file on the drive.

Wife Beater

That sounds like what I am looking for. Thanks bud.

arkon

If you have something on there that might get you a stretch in clink then the only way to be sure is to dismantle the drive. Take out the platters and physically destroy each one. Even a complete over-write of the drive isn’t sure to make the data irretrievable.

Wife Beater

Easy tiger, just a bit of porn and no jail bait AFAIK.

You are obviously a guy with a long forehead and a spectacle wearer because of your knowledge of hard drives and platters (Whatever they are) but it is all a bit above me.
I am getting scared about giving this computer out now.

arkon

Just so long as you don't go to your next barbie here with the wrong kind of platter....A barbie platter is a plate covered in some kind of ecoli infested meat and or salad, whereas a hard drive platter is a round disk covered in magnetic material and really no good for a barbie. Then there's the platters a jive group from the 50's also no good to take to a barbie and also no good for storing your porn on!

Bob

yeah, but for most, f-disk will do a good enough job, and if worried about it, could always defrag the drive and do it again.....a sector by sector write over is over kill, just to clear a bit of porn

Bob

aye, put a whole through the seal will be a good way to make drive unusable, followed by the microwave...but wouldn't be much use to the person your giving the drive to now would it

arkon

I was going to suggest the microwave but decided against it LOL. I wouldn't want to be responsible for the possible ensuing fire!

I didn't realise he wanted to give away or sell on the drive or even re-use it. But I bet that muppet famous person a few years ago (forgotten name). Who took his drive in for repair when it was full of kiddy porn regrets not putting a hole in it and cooking in a microwave.

The only reason I know anything about this for those thinking there must be some sinister reason. Is I used to have 50+ programmers and artists under my employ and the amount of naughty stuff they had was untrue. No matter what they did to hide the fact I always managed to get the data back!

Ban the internet at work! That would curtail the problem IMHO.

Bob

oh aye, but how cool does it look

And your thinking of Gary Glitter...

But speaking of, where I volunteer, they get a lot of puter stuff from department of defence, and there's a surprising about of hard drives that said they ahve been wiped but haven't been properly wiped, couple of laptops still had government CD's in the rom drives *lol*

arkon

LOL! yes glitter I think it was. Took his machine to PCWorld to get it fixed where the technician found it full of bad stuff.

One of the reasons I miss good carboot sales is I used to get a laugh from buying people's very old PC's and hard drives and having a sticky beak at what they had left on them. A bit like rummaging around a strangers house! Amazing the kind of stuff people throw away, like bank details and passwords and pins! Oh and the funniest was a set of correspondance between a bloke and his mistress behing the wifes back!