Cleaning My Hard Drive

[VolAgent]

Absolutely. Premised on negligence. An encrypted harddrive meets HIPAA requirements, surely doing a factory reset does a better job of destroying data than an encrypted drive. I think your paranoia is getting the better of you. Either way, simply removing the drive is a great way to prevent others from having your information.

A standard reformat simply deletes the NTFS MFT. The data is still there, you just got rid of the table of contents.

Being encrypted is a hiding the data to begin with. There was no mention if it was encrypted or not.

 

[0b1kanobee]

I poured gasoline on mine and set it on fire after I removed the battery. Then I smashed it with a sledgehammer several times. Then I used a regular hammer. Finally I separated the debris among a few different trash cans. Maybe I'm just paranoid.

 

[Tahoe Ray]

I poured gasoline on mine and set it on fire after I removed the battery. Then I smashed it with a sledgehammer several times. Then I used a regular hammer. Finally I separated the debris among a few different trash cans. Maybe I'm just paranoid.

I smashed mine first before I burned it...did I get the process wrong?

 

[xrac]

I poured gasoline on mine and set it on fire after I removed the battery. Then I smashed it with a sledgehammer several times. Then I used a regular hammer. Finally I separated the debris among a few different trash cans. Maybe I'm just paranoid.

I wouldn't call that paranoid. Maybe crazy!

 

[senior-advisor-indiana]

I poured gasoline on mine and set it on fire after I removed the battery. Then I smashed it with a sledgehammer several times. Then I used a regular hammer. Finally I separated the debris among a few different trash cans. Maybe I'm just paranoid.

I can't believe you out it in trash cans. That is crazy. You should have flushed it down the toilet...

 

[DHK]

You didn't shoot your hard drive? C'mon... that's the way they're doing it these days!

 

[Norwayguy]

I poured gasoline on mine and set it on fire after I removed the battery. Then I smashed it with a sledgehammer several times. Then I used a regular hammer. Finally I separated the debris among a few different trash cans. Maybe I'm just paranoid.

I personally feel the smashing of the computer should come before setting it on fire for two reasons:

1. Smashing it breaks the computer into smaller pieces exposing more of the internal components as opposed to just melting the plastic exterior.

2. You less likely to get soot on you if you smash the laptop before it has been set on fire and been covered in soot.

You forgot a step the seperating the debris to different trash cans is good but next time only allow 1 trash can at a time to go to the dump so the debris is not dumped into the same dump truck.

 

[insurancexpert]

There are a few commercial softwares out there which can wipe your drive super clean. They run in what is known as passes. So you can decide how many passes you want to run. More passes you select, more securely you wipe out the data. Simple reformatting will not get rid of data but will just hide it from OS, which is what you may not want if your data is sensitive.

 

[gflo]

I would never sell a computer without first wiping the hard drive, its just too easy to recover deleted or formatted data. You might have PHI, saved passwords, or incriminating pictures? To wipe, you need to pull the drive out and put into another computer. You cannot wipe the drive your booting from. To wipe data, use CCleaner - its free and works good. You can download 7 from MS directly, then change the product activation key.

I personally put my old hard drives into a blender and turn it into a breakfast drink, helps with my memory.

 

[GoCubsGo]

I pop the hard drive and donate the rest to someone who rebuilds them for the needy cause I'm a charitable deduction kind of guy. Much easier, less worries.

Had to make this post because if you don't post in a while these days the forum harasses you until you do.