How do you wipe a busted hard drive?

[RaiderJ]

Are you guys really THAT concerned with a Seagate tech getting your info? If so, just buy a new damn hard drive.

 

[buleyb]

Originally posted by: RaiderJ
Are you guys really THAT concerned with a Seagate tech getting your info? If so, just buy a new damn hard drive.

The best advice so far

 

[EyeOfThe]

Originally posted by: SUOrangeman
I've successfully RMA'd drives by just returning the circuit board and the top of the drive. I've never done it for personal use, but I'm sure a knowledgeable RMA staffer on the other end of te phone would give you this option.

-SUO

Actually, this was the best advice so far.

 

[Viper96720]

Actually best advice was why do you credit card info on a hard drive in the first place. A hacker would love you if he or she ever hacked your computer.

 

[Cleaner]

I use a program called Autoclave. It can do between 1 and 7 passes on a hard drive writing 1's and 0's. They claim that 1 is sufficient for most people, 3 is good for all but the most classified data, and 7 for the NSA. The biggest problem with this is time. I had a NAS unit that died, it had 5 IDE hard drives in it with a software RAID. Well one of the hard drives died completely and Maxtor told me to send them the whole unit back. So I had to wipe out the other 4 drives completely. My company does consulting work for schools and we have data records on almost every kid in the country. Needless to say this isn't data that is allowed to get out. So I wiped each of the four drives with Autoclave using 3 passes. It took DAYS but YMMV.

 

[SUOrangeman]

I cannot remember if some of the drives I've RMA'd were from Seagate or not. One of them may have been. Anyway, my job has rules ... and one of those rules as that hard drives (well, the ones from my lab) must be destroyed or returned to the sponsor.

-SUO

 

[JulesMaximus]

I just take my old worn out/non functioning drives and put a few rounds of .45 ACP through them. I'd like to see someone try to get information off those platters.

 

[SkaarjMaster]

Try a Chevy!

 

[GonzoDaGr8]

Originally posted by: JulesMaximus
I just take my old worn out/non functioning drives and put a few rounds of .45 ACP through them. I'd like to see someone try to get information off those platters.

I prefer 30-'06 @ 200 yards with tracer rounds.

 

[GonzoDaGr8]

BTW, EyeOfThe, If you are so worried about the data that you have on your drive, I would personally just trash the drive beyond recognition and get a new one. Not worth stressing over who might end up with your personall info, And by the time you get some sort of tool to erase it completely, You will allready be a bit of cash and time into it that you could have been spending on buying and setting up a new drive.