erasing hard drive with magnets

[uhohspaghetti-o]

does anyone know how to erase or wipe a hard drive with magnets? i suspect that the thick metal housing of the drive may shielf the platters from the effect of strong external magnets...

any ideas?

[MikeV]

Don't do it. There are control tracks that are written on the platters that control the drives writting to them. If they get erased the drive is DEAD!
You can not write the information back to the drive because it has no idea where to write it.

In order to erase the drive you need a very high current electromagnet. One from a metal salvage yard could erase the drive. Your other option would be to open the drive up, take out the platters and run a strong magnet across both sides.

[pacmania_2001]

Could come in handy though when the feds come knocking on the door

[SLK001]

Why would anyone want to do this? After we "erase" the drive, we would have to format it anyway, which ALSO erases the data (but, like MikeV said, this would be impossible because we have destroyed the control tracks).

The magnetic flux density at the head is very high - much higher than you could ever achieve with a magnet (unless you use MikeV's electromagent, which will probably pull the tacks out of your carpet, too). To demonstrate this, try to erase a floppy with a magnet - damn near impossible without a VERY STRONG magnet.

The metal housing on a typical drive is either aluminum or of a zinc alloy - neither which will impede a static magnetic field. Let's keep the electromagnets in the junk yard where they belong!

[JackDudd]

Uhm... this may sound silly, but why not just format your HD????

[tom28]

I believe company like On Track can recover data even it is formatted...didn't we have unformat untilities a while back in the win31 and win95 days??

[zzyzzx]

Download the low level format utilities from your HD manufacturer and do a low level format. That should get rid of everything.

[uhohspaghetti-o]

feds will come after me huh...

the hard drive is broken as it is. the arm is immobilized. i just like keeping my data to myself and none other...that's all.

therefore, i am not interested in using this drive again...i am interested, however, in returning the drive for warranty replacement.

thanks again

[Tommy]

hmmmm what about with one of those tape erasiers? I remember a couple....ok a few years ago you could go to radioshack and pick up a bulk tape erasier. Basically it was this thing that looked like a rectangle iron you turned it on and passed it over the tape and it was erased. Might work, but then you would still probably have to take the drive apart.

[tom28]

I would think taking the drive apart void the warrantees....if I were you and I think I have too much personal info on the drive...I will forget about getting a replacement and destroy my drive.

[SLK001]

Unless you have records of drug transactions, or other illegal activities on your HD, I wouldn't worry about loosing any personal info on the drive. The people who repair them don't have the time (or the desire) to search through the drive for any "nuggets" and such, and will simply fix the problem then do a low-level format on them. This will permanently remove any of your stuff.

Or, if you still are reluctant to expose your info, HDs are pretty cheap these days, so just throw it in a drawer and buy another (bigger and faster, of course!).

[zzyzzx]

I think the warranty people are too busy to scan your HD for kittie porn so I say go ahead and send it in.

[wellmashed]

I think the warranty people are too busy to scan your HD for kittie porn so I say go ahead and send it in.

This is how they caught Mr.Glitter though innit...........

PC poorly......In for repair........Some nosy fecker.........Dibble......Jail......

[furwatup]

just make yourself an electromagnet right at home, go and get yourself a roll of single strand 12 gage wire THHN from your local electric supply house the longer the better, i would suggest something like a 2500 foot spool go home leave it on the spool cut the center out so you can fit the hard drive down in the middle of the spool find both ends of the wire and plug each one into and outlet in your home (one in one slot and one in the other slot) this will create one hell of an electromagnet eventually it will trip your breaker but not for a while if it isnt strong enough to erase your hard drive i dont know what would be

(disclaimer) i am not responsible for anything!!!

[vulture]

If your goal is to completely eliminate data from your HDD, I recommend using Eraser: http://www.tolvanen.com/eraser/ It will overwrite the disk with garbage data, up to X number of times, in different ways. Nice freeware program.

[uhohspaghetti-o]

sounds good and tempting to build my own electro-magnet.
perhaps putting some kind of small load in series to combat breaker-tripping tendencies...

thank you.

as for the software utility, the whole point of this is to erase a hard drive without some utility because the arm in the drive is broken.

thanks everyone

[furwatup]

i honestly dont think the breaker would ever trip if you used a 2500 foot spool or two in series it all depends on resistance

[vulture]

as for the software utility, the whole point of this is to erase a hard drive without some utility because the arm in the drive is broken.

If that's the case, just dismantle the drive and physically destroy the platters. It's fun, I did that once. And it'll probably be faster than finding/building a big ole electromagnet.

[zzyzzx]

Ome more thing, the platters fly pretty good.

[tom28]

I thought copper wire is expensive?? 2500foot of copper wire?? probably you can use that money to get yourself a new hard drive since hard drive is cheap now.....What is the capacity of your hard drive? So I still think you should just destoy your hard drive and forget about the warrentees. 8)

[Greg12]

CD-R's are fun to shoot with BB guns.


Try the same with hard drive plates