formating advice

millwalll

whats the best way to remove everything off a computer so there no way it can be read or brought back basically i am getting a new laptop and gonna sell my old one on ebay but i do work that involves a lot important data so i need to format my laptop before i sell is so there no way on earth anyone can retrieve the data is it best to fdisk the drive then go c:/format c and format it

shutton54321

To totally make it safe probs have to pay for a decent program.

However there are freeware programs such as
http://www.heidi.ie/eraser/
http://www.majorgeeks.com/downloads12.html gives a list of some freeware progams for this, make sure if yourdownloading its freeware otherwise it will cost.


These will wipe files and write over them several times making them relatively unrecoverable.

And then yeah would format the disk. Cant really go wrong that way makes sure that the files are unrecoverable

timberflake

The best way imo would be to use your os disk to format and reinstall the os. I do this about once a year to clean up my PC. It's dead easy, just start your computer up, pop yuor os disk in (Windows ME/XP I'm guessing?) restart and boot from the CD when prompted. You then delete the partition you currently have, format (don't use quck format) and reinstall.

A word of warning though, there is no way to be 100% certain data cannot be retrieved. I've heard that even a PC that has been formatted in this way could in threory have the data retrieved, however, you would have to be pretty darn good with computers to do so. This is your safest bet.

millwalll

yeah thanks i will do that

albertross_2

To completely wipe you hard disk, and make all data unrecoverable:


http://www.cbltech.ca/data-shredder.html
http://dban.sourceforge.net/
both free. Overwrite 7 or more times.

This will wipe the operating system as well, and any recovery partitions, so unless you have the o/s CD, you'll be selling it without an o/s

Blacksheep1979

would also recomend dban - reinstalling your os will not remove all the data as it only writes to part of the hd - and it will more than likely be the same areas that the os was on before and not the data you're trying to remove.

timberflake

Blacksheep1979 wrote:

would also recomend dban - reinstalling your os will not remove all the data as it only writes to part of the hd - and it will more than likely be the same areas that the os was on before and not the data you're trying to remove.

But when you delete the partition and format the drive your not just formatting part of the drive, your formatting the WHOLE drive. IMHO, a clean reinstall is the only way to be confident you've deleted eveything and got a clean slate.

mobfant

timberflake wrote:

But when you delete the partition and format the drive your not just formatting part of the drive, your formatting the WHOLE drive. IMHO, a clean reinstall is the only way to be confident you've deleted eveything and got a clean slate.

Does that not just write over the data once, as opposed to 7+ times with an eraser type program?

Chrith

a sledge hammer :rotfl:

but really juust open up my computer and righ click on you hard drive and click format.
or

click start then run and type in 'cmd' without quotes

and type in format (whatever the drive you want to format, normally C)

albertross_2

The only secure way is to use a wiper (7-35 times), then reinstall the o/s/.

albertross_2

you can't format a disk from within the o/s running on it, it has to be done from a boot floppy/usb stick/CD/DVD.