Is selling my laptop safe?

[vid83]

I am buying a desktop and want to sell my laptop.
If the hard drive is removed, will it be safe to sell the laptop?
Can anyone get any personal information from the serial number?

[greymalkin]

if you're that paranoid you probably shouldn't be on the internet..people can get way more information about you here than a serial number on a laptop.

Generally no a serial number isn't going to open your life story to anyone, but if someone really has it out for you that bad, you've got bigger things to worry about.

[vid83]

I just didn't know for example if my laptop was registered, if they could somehow find out by contacting HP and giving the serial number.

[Noahtuck]

Who in their right mind would buy a laptop with no HDD
Pretty useless without it!!


Better check under your bed and in your closet before going to sleep

There are programs to do multiple wipes on your HDD to remove any personal info.

[MOVIEGEEK]

Who in their right mind would buy a laptop with no HDD
Pretty useless without it!!


Better check under your bed and in your closet before going to sleep

There are programs to do multiple wipes on your HDD to remove any personal info.

+1
Even a XP or Vista CD can do a wipe,all you do at the prompt is type "format C:".

[greymalkin]

I just didn't know for example if my laptop was registered, if they could somehow find out by contacting HP and giving the serial number.

There's your answer! You could find out by contacting HP. Anything we have to say here is just a guess.

[jagabo]

Even a XP or Vista CD can do a wipe,all you do at the prompt is type "format C:".

And then anyone with an unformat utility can restore most of the files.

[vid83]

Who in their right mind would buy a laptop with no HDD
Pretty useless without it!!

Some people sell it for parts.

[freebird73717]

http://www.killdisk.com/

[victoriabears]

I tend to be in the "There is no need to be that paranoid camp", but.............

The Canadian military and government physically remove and destroy hard drives by drilling them before sale of the computer, and a school I worked for also did the same.

Evidently software formatting and wiping does NOT 100% guarentee that the data cannot be read somehow.

[greymalkin]

I work at a big company and they use this application that overwrites the drive 7 times with all 1's..or maybe it alternates 1's on one wipe and 0's on the other...not sure but it's supposed to be pretty effective.

but the OP didn't really ask about the hard drive :P

[redwudz]

The US government commonly runs used hard drives through a shredder to guarantee no chance of data recovery. This is a big timesaver compared to wiping the drive. Some 'wiping' programs fill a drive with alternate ones and zeros, and repeat this process as many times as needed.

But, passwords, credit card numbers and other sensitive types of data are generally encrypted in a computer unless you just have them listed in plain text. (A very bad idea) If a hacker wants to obtain that type of info, there are easier ways than buying used laptops.

But you can use freeware utilities to effectively wipe a hard drive. You will need to do this from a boot disc, CD or floppy, or maybe a USB stick, depending on your computer setup. If you were to do this with a minimum 5 pass wipe, you could reinstall the OS from the recovery discs and be probably 99% sure you haven't leaked out any sensitive information. (Just don't wipe the recovery partition or you won't be able to use the recovery discs.)

You would find a lot more buyers for your laptop if it has a working OS.

[lordsmurf]

You're not that important to be paranoid.
Military, yes.
John Q. Nobody, no.

[Number Six]

You would find a lot more buyers for your laptop if it has a working OS.

Maybe so - but I have bought a few very nice laptops extremely cheap because they did not have a hard drive, or because they had a very small problem like a dead inverter or a damaged power connector. Most people sell these things because they can't fix them, or because it would be too expensive to have it repaired. I am a technician, and hard drives, memory, CMOS batteries, and inverters are very cheap - so their loss is my gain

[handyguy]

I have read posts of people selling dell computers & buyer calls for service & who gets billed? Person who initially bought it, they trace with that serial number I guess.