Well, its time for the "monthly" format again,(lmao), and i would like to REALLY clean the hd this time..
As we all know, formatting does NOT clean your files off completely, and i want to clean it really well this time.

Any proggies that any one would recommend for this? I dont want to have to FDISK afterwords, just be able to throw my XP cd in, and re- install after the "wiping"..

Thanks everyone!



wase4711

I was under the impression that as long as you didn't choose quick format that that was a wipe?

Ya, same here. Or, if you have a Maxtor, then you could use Powermax, and perform a low-level format.

wase - have you checked out WIPE and ZAP, not to mention
Drive Fitness Test Version 1.50 from here:
_http://www.microstorage.com/Harddriveinfo.htm#Zap


and of course this
_http://www.pcnineoneone.com/howto/cleandrive1.html :P

nope, the ONLY way to truly get ALL the data erased completely off your HD is to get a wiping program. Formatting only cleans most of the data off your HD, but any restoration company, or law enforcement agency can easily recover your data off a "formatted" hard drive, unless you wipe it clean!!

If you've ever seen stories on the news, about people who go to landfills, and grab old pc's that have been buried there, they say at least 80% of them have hd's with data they were able to recover!!!

Its not a bad idea to do this when you re-format; i just am not sure the best proggie to use to do this..it has to be bootable, and it has to work prior to windows loading...


wase4711

@Richard, thanks for the pcnineonone link!!
:rtfm:

No, no maxxtor, but a Western Digital...
I will check out those proggies, Richard..Thanks!


wase4711

There are some free utils out there - one on sourceforge comes to mind but the link is at work - I will update when I get back to my resources (faster connection and other stuff ;) ) at work tommorrow :)

/JD

Thanks Jack! I will look for it tomorrow!


wase4711

I think that all the diagnostic tools have the option to zero fill a drive
(partitions are also deleted !!!!)
Maxtor , IBM Seagate and the others have these tools

Used them sometimes, but can take a lot of time on large disks

As for Western Digital
DL G Diagnostic

http://support.wdc.com/download/index.asp

thank you grey pidgeon! grabbed the utility and it looks like what I want...
Now, if only I could remember how to FDISK!!!


wase4711

does anyone have the seagate one? i looked on their site, but didn't see anything about such a thing. thanks.

Here's a small low-level format utility by East-Tec called Sanitizer. http://www.east-tec.com/sanitizer/index.htm
or
Active@ KillDisk - Hard Drive Eraser v.1.1http://www.killdisk.com/eraser.htm

Grab the freeware boot floppy maker here.
http://www.killdisk.com/downloads/ki...loppysetup.exe

This can overwrite up to 99 times. Not just simply a low-level format utility.
All partitions and formatting is stripped. Industrial strength!
Active@ KillDisk conforms to US Department of Defense clearing and sanitizing standard DoD 5220.22-M.
Sending you more info on the last one Nomadj

ahh... How about partition magic? You can run a low level on it. Doesn't that "wipe" the info?

adams73533 Hope this helps. http://www.seagate.com/support/kb/di...lfmt_what.html http://www.seagate.com/support/seatools/index.html

Nomadj

With a western digital go get the disk utilities program from WD and write 0's (Zeros) to the disk it Wipes the whole disk clean.the whole disk it takes quite awhile but it does the job . I have used this to get rid of a password.

I use Eraser:
http://www.heidi.ie/eraser/

And Create A Nuke Boot Desk :P

um fdisk is pretty easy man

just get a winme boot disk or whatever

then do fdisk

and then create your partions and shit

then format each partion like format c:

takes to damn long though thats for sure

thanks to Sonny and Will Sasso at another board for telling me about this app to do the low level format too.

i haven't tried it yet, but its there in case you do.


btw, thanks nomadj for the links to seagates.

yea I agree with u war59312, but winme sux i wouldnt even trust a bootdisk from it.. I'd rather use win98 or sumn.... I get them from www.bootdisk.com .. they have quite a selection there.

Here is the link I promised wase :)

Darik's Boot and Nuke v1.0.1
by Darik Horn
Relevant URL:http://dban.sourceforge.net/
Platforms: Os Independent
Summary:

Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) is a self-contained boot floppy that securely wipes the hard disks of most computers. DBAN will automatically and completely delete the contents of any hard disk that it can detect, which makes it an appropriate utility for bulk or emergency data destruction.

:smoke:

/JD

Thanks, Jack...The Wizzer also suggested this option, so I will take the plunge with this over the weekend...
Do you have to FDISK after using this, or just throw the XP cd after its finished doing its "thing"?

And Thanks again to War, and everyone else who has responded to my question!!
What a bunch of talented, knowledgeable folks we have here!!


:toot:


wase4711

well i decided to do it this evening. started with the 80gb maxtor and its only about half done.

still have a 40 and a 20gb seatgate to do.

No you don't have to fdisk it, just stick in your xp cd and create/format (for fat32 or ntfs) a new partition using it. Then continue with the setup. ( I just did a llf overnight/this morning so that is how i know).