How do I "erase" my computer

[71MUSTY]

Most newer laptops do not support F250


So borrow a ford truck and run it over.

[Dano3467]

Ask John Koskinen of the IRS, he know a guy !

[ARKLITE881South]

Did you mean the IRS?

YESssssssssssss

[ARKLITE881South]

Did you mean the IRS?

thanks, edited

[FML1982]

Take hard drive out and use ball peen hammer, standard government procedure. they had us smashing hard drives one day while waiting to class up for my MOS. It is very effective way of keeping people from getting any info off of them.

[epic1856]

Dban is your friend and is free. Nothing will survive

I used this for some computers I had awhile ago.

http://www.dban.org/download

+1 on DBAN Boot & Nuke.

It wipes EVERYTHING. when done literally you get a blank screen.

[gabe123]

DO NOT delete any files just yet. Download this software called ERASER. Then use it to erase your files. Go to your browser and delete all files and cookie. Then use the the program to delete the blank space in your disk. This method is sufficient for 99% of user out there. If you know how to restore your system to factory default, do it and then erase the blank space. That should work too. Or you can just change encryption key of your drive, if your hardware support it. This is the best method, and nobody ( but NSA and your creator) can recover data. Of course you might have to restore ssytem before return.

[the86d]

2 ways to correctly (quickly) do it.

1) IF, and only IF you can factory it with a restore (on HDD, or restore CD) and NOT KEEP your files, do that, then fill the drive with anything non-personal, then erase the temp non-personal files (ISO's are good).

2) IF you have a restore DVD/CD set (or the correct Windows disc?), boot to a LIVE Linux CD/DVD with a non-*buntu cd (unless you REALLY like to wait for a boot... Slackware is my preference) and do a "dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sda bs=1M" and that will wipe the entire disk is most cases (if a new computer [last 15+ years?]), then you can restore(/install) from CD/DVD, assuming you have one.

Multi-pass DoD wipes are useless as long as it is not an SSD/flash (from what I have read), if it is a physical spinning platter my ways will help, and are quickest, or data can still be obtained, unless overwritten after delete.

[M1NM]

I want to know what company is going to let him return a computer after "a few months".

[antiseen]

I'd format it and be done with it. I'd take my chances that the next person that got it wouldn't know how(or want) to run a basic ****ty recovery program that barely works, let alone a data recovery expert that moonlights as an identity thief.

[AGFNTB]

Multi-pass DoD wipes are useless as long as it is not an SSD/flash (from what I have read), if it is a physical spinning platter my ways will help, and are quickest, or data can still be obtained, unless overwritten after delete.

Not true. multi-pass wipes are the most effective, on any drive. The reason you do not normally want to perform this on an SSD is that the cells on an SSD have a limited number of cycles (reads/writes) before they fail. However, this is not applicable to a drive being returned. If security ("erasing as the OP asked about) is the end game then a multi pass with a clean install of OS is the way to go.

Modern thinking is that 1 pass wipes are sufficient, but I have been able to pull data (albeit garbled in some cases) from 1pass drives.

Restoring or re-setting does nothing to erase non-OS data stored to the drive.

[Skipper]

http://mutilatefilewiper.com/

[Anti-Hero]

Heh...

[DOGSPEED]

I want to know what company is going to let him return a computer after "a few months".

Costco, they let you return almost anything. I'm not quite as angry as I was last night. I think I will start a separate thread and see if CG can help me fix it instead of returning it. I have NO idea what some of you are talking about beyond "buy this disk and run it".

[michiganboy]

2 words


loise lener








2 words loise leaner.