Erase my hard drive questions...

[nissmo300]

I want to erase my hard drive so that any info on will not be/ cannot be restored. I once heard about zero filling it. Dont know exactly what that means but can you guys give me some advice as to which software is the best at this.

[The village idiot]

Western Digital drives have a utility that will write all zeros to the disk, effectively erasing it. If it is not a WD drive, you can get PGP encryption package, and use it's tools to wipe a drive to beyond DOD specs. It is a free for personal use appliction, just use google or something to find it.

[g_shocker182]

There was a huge thread on this a while back. I couldn't find that but here 's something smaller:

https://www.videohelp.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=181698

[iooi]

I want to erase my hard drive so that any info on will not be/ cannot be restored

Not sure how good zero filling is but the only true safe method is the one used by governments and other agency's is to totally destroy the drives. Large hammers and fires are known to be best...You have got to smash the platters to bits.

[nissmo300]

Found some info on this topic. Intresting read.

"I read all this CACHE CLEAN stuff, here and wonder about all this worry and such."

First off.
If you are doing something illegal on your computer, your efforts to remove it will be wasted. You run your cleaner ( 500 titles, on FileGeek.com last look) Run HistoryKill or Cookie and Cache killer programs and they will kill the user.dat file or at least attempt it and on reboot try again. The reason it is hard to kill is because WINDOWS has this file locked. If windows can't own its locked files , then your silly GUI goes dead. BY DESIGN !


Lets say you have a new 80gig hard drive (you poor devil). Now in order to clean your TRACKS, you must find all these files and
delete them. This will keep you busy most the day. I feel your pain.

Ah, but deleting does, not delete files, (it only MARKS them as deleted, with full content). Well, you then must delete them or better use Norton Military file WIPE. this will erase it 7 times with many file patterns. 0xAA , 0xFF , 00 , 0xfF ,etc. Another day wasted. I assume you emptied your waste basket at each delete.

If you really do something illegal and your hard drive ends up at the FBI, they have special harddrive analysist systems with special analog heads that can read your platters. This is called ghost domain reading. If you are a Kiddy Porn seller, you should wake up. The FBI will find you. Thank God, for the FBI.

Now if all you are doing, is trying to protect MOM from seeing your porn, then run Windows Washer 48 (latest) and pray it does a good job. If this is not enough, then search out all the files mentioned in this GROUP and delete them.

I see people wondering why the Cache folders are random names, It is says right in the MS OS eng. documentation on line, that this is, to make it hard for damn crackers, that have already broken into your system, figure out what cache belongs, to whom. Etc.

It is just low level protection that MS is using here, not some Communist threat. Just giving you a little protection, because you forgot, what a fire wall, is all about. The hiding is not for you honest people, it is for the CROOKS! Just speed bumps for the Cracker, nothing less. Keep an open mind and remember computers have many I/O points of interface.


Here is a list of protection steps:

Delete your files (per this massive group list, USER.dat, etc, etc) then ERASE and do a MIL. Spec WIPE FILE on all deleted files and all
empty space. After all, empty space was your files, at one time (you cant prove it wasnt, if you run Defrag, like a good computer geek).

Now wipe all Empty space.

Now wipe all SLACK space. (tricky this is, but it is real and has your links in it !!)

Now wipe your PAGE FILE. (this is fun and tricky all rolled into one.)

Now last, if you sell your computer, run Norton Wipe Disk or take your computer hard disk apart, remove the platter and and then rub a rare earth high power magnet over every inch of every platter top and bottom. Then throw this sucker off the nearest bridge at 3am ( ours is 300 to 600 feet deep water). The magnet will saturate the domains in a very radical way. Way past what any Electronic MR heads can operate.

Hard drives are very complex devices and it is very interesting about what goes on inside. Go to Seagate.com and read the engineering manuals. It is very good stuff.

I might mention one more little trick ,

Did you know that the hard drive, all by itself can find a bad sectors and replace it with a good ones. This is why we don't ever find bad sectors, these days (Did you notice this?). Now I wonder what data (of mine, yours) was on the bad sector, MURPHY says it is URL links and other incriminating, information that any tech or engineer can extract.

Think, then think again about using your computer to document any illegal activity. It is just a perfect plateform for the authorities to use against you.

It is no different than the dumb idiots that wash blood off a carpet thinking ,gee they won't find that blood (you are fooling your self, if you think you can erase data, effectively). How ever my simple Magnet trick would be taxing to most (readers).

Have fun and stay clean.


PS:
I will now expain slack space, many? Dont know what it is. (It is tricky and shows how easy it is to read peoples deleted information) I you have a letter to your mom that is 1.024 bytes long. (2 clusters) then you delete it. Then some time later you create a new letter to dad from scratch. Then this new file just happens to be a Cluster from the old letter from your mom, located in delete space (delete = empty and available to the OS).

Now this letter to dad is only 513 bytes long. (uses 2 clusters, again) [ the same two, too) Now if you open this letter and look at it in a hex editor (or binary if you prefer) and look past the 513th byte or so, you (may) will see part of your old letter to mom. [Isnt that precious?] this space, past the end of file maker is the slack space in a file record.

Each HDD has its own rule for minimum cluster size and this is a constant on your system. It varies by HDD size. By Design.

Yes, you can buy an editor that back fills slack space with 0's but most everything else does not, as it is wasteful of time.


Signed:
Mr. Jelly of WA.
I am a computer technician ( 1968 to present) and a retired test engineer , DRAM , EPROMS, gate arrays and Microprocessors. I used to work for Intel and Philips.
This advice comes free and I hope it helps you all.

[808smokey]

Norton System Works has a utility that allows you to wipe 7 times with different combinations of ones and zeros. But... Even then you can still recover information. There's allows a program out there somewhere that can do it. THe CIA's got one that will uncover files that have been written over 5 times with actually files not just ones and zeros.

[The village idiot]

PGP is free, and you can set it to overwrite as many times as you want. & is current DOD spec. If you want to wait for it to finish, you could over write 500 times with PGP, using several methods including all 1, all 0, random combo of 0 and 1, all 3 on different passes. And did I say that it is free? I wouldn't trust Norton to wipe selected parts of my body, let alone my top secret hard drive.

[indolikaa]

In my previous line of work, when erasing a hard drive became necessary, the unit was first bombarded with X-Rays and then incinerated.

If your personal financial situation does not allow you the luxury of such technology, may I recommend PGP and low-level formatting in various combinations.

.indolikaa.
Long Live the W-88

[stiltman]

what about under your avatat

[indolikaa]

What about under your avatar?

Also a proven and effective method. Works well on hard drives, and even better on Princo discs.

[stiltman]

What about under your avatar?

Also a proven and effective method. Works well on hard drives, and even better on Princo discs.

What are Pinco's?

[indolikaa]

Princo's? No one can burn just one, no one can!

Wait, that's Pringles. Sorry.

Princo. When mediocrity counts!

[808smokey]

Nortons wipe program does suck but it's more of a double click and walk away type program. You can use norton to recover the info that you just wiped. LOL

[luvvbuzz]

best app i have used for this is called killdisk. search google and go to the website, they give you a free download, its a trial and only writes zeros to your drive once. it completely erases it, if you buy it you can write over the disk in as many passes as you want, but you could just reuse the trial again and again, but it would take longer.
the site says that it is an eraser that erases so nothing can be recovered, so its perfect if you are selling a drive and you dont want people obtaining your credit card/bank or other personal details that may be on the hard drive.