How to make SURE that the data on a HDD is not recoverable!!!
- Thread starter DaFinn
- Start date
get some liquid oxygen. they have been able to burn diamonds with that stuff. anyway, just open it, take the plates out and melt them. or just stick em in a fire for a while. another possibility is acids like hydrofluoric acid. that would do it.
The size of a magnet you'd need to dis-orientate a harddrive would be massive. We're talking something like 5 X 500 gaus (might not have spelled it right) rare earth magnets.
If you don't have magnets like that, a shogun with either buckshot or slugs will do the work nicely. Or just head over to a local construction site and ask to borrow a sledge hammer (if you don't have one yourself, but what kind of geek doesn't have a sledgehammer?
)
If you don't have magnets like that, a shogun with either buckshot or slugs will do the work nicely. Or just head over to a local construction site and ask to borrow a sledge hammer (if you don't have one yourself, but what kind of geek doesn't have a sledgehammer?
)
sourceninja
Diamond Member
- Mar 8, 2005
- 8,805
- 65
- 91
Nice suggestions BUT... The HDD will be RMA'd. I need to clean it WITHOUT physically breaking it!!! So magnets would work? I tihnk I'll take apart an old hugea$$ speaker...
BUT... The HDD will be RMA'd. I need to clean it WITHOUT physically breaking it!!! So magnets would work? I tihnk I'll take apart an old hugea$$ speaker...No, you need to send it into the sun! :sun:
...or else you could use Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) from sourceforge..
You can do a variety of wipes and as many wipes as you want including using random algorithyms of 1s and 0s.
If data is recoverable after all that, then you have some very intelligent and very rich enemies
Permanent magnets won't do much to data on a hard drive. The actuator positioning is controlled by fairly powerful permanent magnets.
Large electro magnets are what are needed to go this method.
Any method of large scale erasure will possibly put an RMA in trouble. You will erase all the formatting as well, which they may be able to verify, and pin the cause of the failure on. You may want to verify with the HD company that this is okay before you do it.
Destruction is really the way to go. If the data is really that valuable, then it's worth the money that a new hard drive costs.
Actually if it's not spinning then no! Sorry i didn't read the first post!
Well as the other guys said - only something radical which won't let you RMA it. But you should have some confidence that whoever you RMA it to, won't care and won't want to spend the money to recover data - quite often they don't even properly clean the drive before resending it out if the drive has been RMA'd when working fine. However, if it's bust they'll just chuck it - it's not economic to repair it.
Chill
Well as the other guys said - only something radical which won't let you RMA it. But you should have some confidence that whoever you RMA it to, won't care and won't want to spend the money to recover data - quite often they don't even properly clean the drive before resending it out if the drive has been RMA'd when working fine. However, if it's bust they'll just chuck it - it's not economic to repair it.
Chill
Originally posted by: DaFinn
Nice suggestions
If you have a nonfunctional drive and you *cannot* risk letting anybody access the drive's contents, you have a few options:
1) Try to repair the drive by replacing the circuit board with one from the EXACT same model drive. This is only applicable if the failure is electronic; if the motor or drive head is shot, you cannot fix the drive. Once repaired, you can wipe the drive (although you've long since voided your warranty at this point).
2) Find and use a hard drive degausser. You are, however, unlikely to find one of these anywhere but a data recovery-type firm. An MRI scanner's magnets would probably be powerful enough, but that's about it. Even speaker magnets at close range won't scramble the data.
3) Destroy the drive.
All that said, it is highly unlikely anyone will disassemble your drive and attempt to scan the platters, unless they have reason to believe there is VERY valuable data on it. There is a *slim* chance that the drive could be repaired and returned to service without being wiped by the drive company, in which case whoever next received the drive *might* be able to pull *some* data off of it.
IOW, I don't think you need to worry about it.
midget kiddie pr0n. If you can't let others know what a sick bastard you are, then you need to pony up for a drive an not RMA.
dainthomas
Lifer
- Dec 7, 2004
- 14,907
- 3,882
- 136
Chuck it off your nearest large suspension bridge. To be double sure, drag it behind your car on the way to the bridge. To be triple sure, throw it on the grill for a couple hours before you leave. If the data's that valuable (or incriminating), def don't RMA it.
any huge physical damage will void the warrantee. also shock in excess of 300gs will void the warrantee. also, you cant take it apart.
this could be incredibly dangerous, so dont sue me if you die or something. i hope you know how to jumpstart a car. if not, look on the internet because this is very dangerous. instead of hooking the jumper cables up to another car, hook them up to the HDD. start your car. dont do it very long because it might melt or burn it. once again: be VERY CAREFULL if you actually attemp this. im sure it will be really cool.
this could be incredibly dangerous, so dont sue me if you die or something. i hope you know how to jumpstart a car. if not, look on the internet because this is very dangerous. instead of hooking the jumper cables up to another car, hook them up to the HDD. start your car. dont do it very long because it might melt or burn it. once again: be VERY CAREFULL if you actually attemp this. im sure it will be really cool.
I'm sorry Dafinn, but you're pretty much out of luck if you want a drive to RMA.
Why not just swallow the cost and buy a new drive?
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