Wiping a hardrive

[Dawgs0916]

I was wondering if anyone can tell me how to wipe a computer of everything thats on it. My friend let me borrow his over the summer, i left it back home for my mom to use and now he needs it back. so how do I get it back to the like default stuff I guess you could say....

Thanks a lot in advance.

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

Find out the manufacturer of the hard drive (maxtor, seagate or so on). Go to their website. They should have a download section for utilities. One of them should be a reformat tool.

You can follow the instructions that will probably have you install the program on a CD or a Floppy.

You load the cd or floppy. Restart your computer and it should load up the program (if your computer it set to check the floppy or cd drives first).

Another way....

If you have say a windowsXP cd. Put the CD in, Restart your computer. Let it load the windows setup and choose the option to install a fresh copy of windows and follow the instructions to reformat the hard drive.

Another way...

If you have another computer. You can hook up the hard drive you want to wipe as a slave or secondary drive. (make sure of course to turn your computer and remove the power cable while you are hooking up the second hard drive, also make sure to use the correct jumper settings on the second hard drive). Restart your computer. Windows should load and it will recognize the second hard drive.

This should add an extra letter (drive) when you click into my computer. So if you used to see A, C you might now see A, C, D.

Find the letter for that second hard drive. Right Click it and choose the FORMAT option from the drop down menu...follow the instructions.

Hope that helps.

 

[Dallas]

Dban.org

 

[Yeagermeister]

I use a free program called killdisk

 

[Kangaroo]

The best method is a few software out there that does low level rewrites over and over again writing nothing but 1's and 0's quite a few free ones that will purge everything. if not boot from a windows disk and wipe or download an ultimate boot disk and wipe the drive.

What i want for work is a degausser they run like 2-3k for a good one

 

[Yeagermeister]

The best method is a few software out there that does low level rewrites over and over again writing nothing but 1's and 0's quite a few free ones that will purge everything. if not boot from a windows disk and wipe or download an ultimate boot disk and wipe the drive.

What i want for work is a degausser they run like 2-3k for a good one

We have one that we haven't used in years. It was a pain in the ***. You had to manually spin the drive the whole time the counter was counting down. Those drives get DAMN hot. lol

 

[bbgun]

Take it from me: deleting those "men seeking men" Craigslist searches can be a real *****.

 

[Dawgs0916]

the dban.org download wont start for me for some reason...and the kill program wont burn the dvd, even though i dont even want to burn one...

bp, is there anyway to tell what kind of hardrive is in there without opening up the cpu. i know i must seem ******** to you guys

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

the dban.org download wont start for me for some reason...and the kill program wont burn the dvd, even though i dont even want to burn one...

bp, is there anyway to tell what kind of hardrive is in there without opening up the cpu. i know i must seem ******** to you guys

Double click the my computer icon
Right click C drive
This will create a drop down menu
Click on the properties option in the drop down menu
This will open a window of sorts
Click on the tab at the top of that window that says Hardware
The harddrive brand should be listed in there.

One other thing I should have mentioned earlier that might help.
If the computer is a dell, compaq or other large name computer, chances are it came with some cds that have windows on them. If so you can load those into your CD rom. Restart your computer and it should load into those programs and give you the option to reload a fresh install of windows. During the course of doing that it will either give you the option to reformat (wipe) your hard drive or it will do it without prompting you.

 

[Jenky]

I was wondering if anyone can tell me how to wipe a computer of everything thats on it. My friend let me borrow his over the summer, i left it back home for my mom to use and now he needs it back. so how do I get it back to the like default stuff I guess you could say....

Thanks a lot in advance.

You have the installation CDs right? I think HP makes you burn it, so check for the OS + Driver disks before you do anything.

 

[Yeagermeister]

the dban.org download wont start for me for some reason...and the kill program wont burn the dvd, even though i dont even want to burn one...

bp, is there anyway to tell what kind of hardrive is in there without opening up the cpu. i know i must seem ******** to you guys

After you download the killdisk file run the installation program and you will have the option to create a bootable cd or usb drive.

 

[Dawgs0916]

After you download the killdisk file run the installation program and you will have the option to create a bootable cd or usb drive.

yeager, i get to this, and it says it deletes or kills the stuff, but it finishes and everything still seems the same as if i did nothing. what am i doing wrong

http://img715.*************/img715/4168/fdgsd.jpg

 

[hairic]

DBAN is also on the ultimate boot cd. As is a version of killdisk.

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/

You could also download truecrypt, encrypt the entire drive, then finish with a format and fresh install. If your friend wanted to look behind the curtains, all he'd see is encrypted garble.