What do I need to do before I sell my used computer?

[MrYogi]

Apart from formatting, does anyone know any softwares that repeatedly write gibberish,0's or 1's.?

 

[boyRacer]

Your hard drive manufacturer should have utilities available for download

 

[TheBoyBlunder]

I'd delete everything through a standard windows format, then install a fresh, blank copy. Then, I'd get Webroot's Window Washer and adjust the bleach setting to 9 times and erase the free space through that. Window Washer is payware though.

 

[her209]

Kik it a coupel of tymes.

 

[slycat]

Originally posted by: MrYogi
Apart from formatting, does anyone know any softwares that repeatedly write gibberish,0's or 1's.?

why?...u had some some uber secrets on there that ur paranoid about?

 

[Barnaby W. Füi]

Originally posted by: slycat

Originally posted by: MrYogi
Apart from formatting, does anyone know any softwares that repeatedly write gibberish,0's or 1's.?

why?...u had some some uber secrets on there that ur paranoid about?

Probably. This little thing we call "privacy."

 

[her209]

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey

Originally posted by: slycat

Originally posted by: MrYogi
Apart from formatting, does anyone know any softwares that repeatedly write gibberish,0's or 1's.?

why?...u had some some uber secrets on there that ur paranoid about?

Probably. This little thing we call "privacy."

Pr0n most likely.

 

[Walleye]

tweakxp will, but it wont do it through a dos prompt... you have to do sections, you cant do your whole drive...

 

[geckojohn]

I wouldn't worry about it too much. You'll probably spend a lot of time trying to get rid of your porn data. Just reformat it w/ a new copy of windows.

 

[IamElectro]

If your that worried about what was on the drive "personal data credit card#'s bank info" sell the computer with out the h/d. Formating or writing zeros to it multiple times wont help if someone really wanted to know what was on the drive they could find out. Saw a thing on tech TV a while ago where a group of guys were able to reconstruct a great deal of data off a h/d that had been formatted like 6 times.

 

[notfred]

I would just sell it. Like I give a sh!t if someone is able to resurrect a few MP3s or my old homework files.

 

[Paulson]

If you format it 7 times with a random write, it will be unrecoverable...

 

[Walleye]

Originally posted by: IamElectro
If your that worried about what was on the drive "personal data credit card#'s bank info" sell the computer with out the h/d. Formating or writing zeros to it multiple times wont help if someone really wanted to know what was on the drive they could find out. Saw a thing on tech TV a while ago where a group of guys were able to reconstruct a great deal of data off a h/d that had been formatted like 6 times.

formatting only removes the tags, not the data.

 

[crazygal]

how do you remove the data then?

 

[Encryptic]

Sell it without the HD if you're that concerned about it. Short of hammering the HD to pieces and incinerating it, you're not going to be able to keep your data safe from someone determined to find it.

 

[Vic]

Originally posted by: her209

Originally posted by: BingBongWongFooey

Originally posted by: slycat

Originally posted by: MrYogi
Apart from formatting, does anyone know any softwares that repeatedly write gibberish,0's or 1's.?

why?...u had some some uber secrets on there that ur paranoid about?

Probably. This little thing we call "privacy."

Pr0n most likely.

Or maybe credit card and bank records, business records, personal correspondence, etc. Not everyone who posts here is a 15 year old porn addict

MrYogi, download the appropriate disk utility from your hard drive manufacturer and follow the instructions. You want to use the low level format or "write all Zeros to drive" utility.

 

[jlee]

Get PGP and set it to 30x disk wipe..IIRC, they recommend 25-ish for government use..so 30 should be alright.