Wiping my HDD without risk of Recovery

wapow

Hiya


I am selling my laptop and want to ensure all my data is wiped and non recoverable by any other user.


I've backed everything up.
What's the best way/top software for doing this?


Thanks All

molerat

How "unrecoverable" do you want your data to be ? How long do you want to spend doing it ?
The only guaranteed way http://diy.com/departments/mac-allister-forged-steel-club-hammer-64oz/703387_BQ.prd
The MOD disassemble the drive and incinerate the disks.

wapow

I didn't say I want to destroy the hardware but if that's what it'll take....


Want to run a few passes to ensure all data is difficult to recover if someone attempted.

S0litaire

Or if you want to have a Drive to give away with the laptop...
DBAN : https://dban.org/
write it onto a USB stick, insert into laptop and boot from it set it running and leave it for a few hours.

tronator

S0litaire wrote: »

Or if you want to have a Drive to give away with the laptop...
DBAN : https://dban.org/
write it onto a USB stick, insert into laptop and boot from it set it running and leave it for a few hours.

...unless the drive is an SSD. Then you need a tool which does a "secure erase" of your SSD.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=securely+erase+ssd

esuhl

DBAN is tried and tested for mechanical hard drives.

Bear in mind that the PC will then need an operating system installed to make it usable.

jshm2

You don't actually need to wipe. Just do a full factory restore and defrag. Then open Glary's utilities (it's free) and do a free space wipe

This will usually suffice unless you've some real dodgy stuff to hide.

santiano

As we know copy paste overwrites data and hardly retrieves by any data recovery software.
But, if you really want to assure data not to be recovered then opt for Data Wipe software which erases data by wiping its contents beyond recovery, destroying its name, dates and finally removing it from the Disk.

JJ_Egan

<erases data by wiping its contents beyond recovery>

Not true and the write up posted is misleading .
Forensic recovery can be used .

DigForVictory

Some time ago, I was handed a disk which the owner was confident was wiped.
Unfortunately, his confidence was misplaced.

Frankly, unless you're into taking risks, I back the judicious use of a black & decker drill &/or a mallet until the unit is bent metal & powder.

AndyCF

If you look at Youtube there is a video or three of some kind of 'disk shredder' , it looks just like a huge, giant type of paper shredder but the opening is huge and it takes hard drives ( ! )

I did read once on some forum or other ages ago a scrapyard electromagnet (the ones they pick cars up with) is supposed to be reasonably effective as its that strong it can apparently pull the heads off, although I'd not want to confirm this is the case or not.

If you are concerned then a wipe with 'all 1's' , 'all 0's' , 'random' may do. Want to go further then finish with a zero fill afterwards. Random will likely be the slowest fill anyway moreso if its using PRNG for the erm 'randomness'

Little point I think going any further, things like Gutmann are really for older designs aka MFM vs RLL

Use an external utility ideally one of the free Linux based ones, Dban and I'd also consider BCWipe too maybe as you want something that will access the drive directly and not rely on the Bios, this way it may also attempt to write to any defective sectors which is worth it "trying"