Posted on 06/28/2016 3:39:49 PM PDT by nickcarraway
They’re welcome to the bits and bytes they can scrap off the face of the sledge hammer I used to pancake that sucker.
REM gfy.cmd
format c: /y
again:
echo ESADMOFO >> c:\ESAD.TXT
goto again
erase c:\ESAD.TXT
goto again
I use my old computers for target practice.
I think I have one of those in the basement. It might be a 20.
A few years ago I bought a computer off eBay from someone upgrading to a newer model. Although he had deleted a bunch of stuff, I found a login ID that was deleted but the partition still existed. It was his girlfriend’s login on the computer, full of private financial and personal information. I’m not that type of person to take advantage of that, and I wiped the data. With that information to bank accounts, SSI#, passwords etc. I could have wreaked havoc in her life. Just goes to show you, do secure multiple wipes of hard drives in your computer before selling it.
Went back next day (it was a Saturday/Sunday sale),told the guy what I found and he said "you look like an honest guy,I know you won't abuse it".
Well,I *am* and honest guy and *didn't* abuse it
But....yikes! Foolish guy!
Fixed to a 4x4 post, it makes a good target for my Beowulf .50cal. And a new seagate sata 500gb 7200rpm replacement, is a cheap $50 or so.
I was working on an HP laptop that had a finicky CMOS. The hard drive had failed and it wouldn’t accept anything that I tried in it. So I went to ebay and bought an identical drive. Before I installed it I slaved it to another machine. Sure enough - it was complete with personal data, movies, and porn.
I can’t remember how many passes I made on it before I trusted it with any software.
HP (has problems) systems being onery is no surprise. I avoid them and recommend others buy something else when asked.
“formatting a drive erases data”
No, it doesn’t. Even deleting the partition won’t, unless the sectors are overwritten.
Had to laugh at the title you have devised for your techique for dealing with no longer needed hard drives.
I use the same process: full disassembly and deep, heavy scoring of the platters followed by personally taking them to the electronics salvage point at the county dump.
Always get a smile when hand them a large ziplock bag full of hard drive components.
I crush mine with a log splitter.Try to recover data after that.
“I use my old computers for target practice.”
Bingo! They are not bullet proof. 45ACP removes about a 1/2 inch chunk for every disc hit.
Two options with hard drives.
Target practice
Dismantle them. The platters make great coasters. The super powerful magnets can hold a cast iron skillet to the refrigerator.
I guess I could crank up one if dad’s dozers and drop the blade a few times and drive over the remains.
If someone can recover data from that, they are welcome to it.
I have a magnet that you could tow the Queen Mary with.
CCleaner. Free drive wiper. Wipes the drive or just free space. Several levels of depth available. I use it regularly.
I would say that unless what you have is so valuable that the NSA would use cyrogenic superconducting magnetic heads on it, a DOD-certified wipe will do it these days. There was a time (on <100 meg drives) when you could actually replace the disks themselves to a “good” drive and read them; then, there was a time (<10gigs, lets say) when you could replace disks and the PCB from a known good drive and read a bad disk. Both of these techniques could be done under “reasonably clean” conditions, even in your home. Now, the density is so high and the drive is setup with magic factory parameters that marry the disks, heads, mech, and PCB, super-secret proprietary firmware and algorithms that are probably known by 10 people at the factory, I’d say that recovery by mere mortals is just about impossible.
I’ve done the sorts of things described above twice in my career and grown men almost cried with joy.
Who sells a used hard Drive? That’s crazy.
Make wind chimes out if them, or trip wires. Whatever floats your boat. Just degauss them first.
They’d make good targets too. Be creative.
Get a cheap docking station, and keep your hard drives. I have several old hard drives that I still use.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.