up vote 0 down vote favorite
1
share [g+] share [fb]

Possible Duplicate:
Securely format a hard drive
How to wipe a USB hard drive

What is a freeware app i can use to wipe a HD? I have two

1) My external which is <1yr old and is reported 'failure' on disk health checks (maybe i wont bother wiping this?)

2) My laptop which i may send in for repairs or get it replace. It currently is under warranty.

I think i could just write a program that writes random bytes to the HD until i have no space. Would this be good enough? (This app wont work on the broken/external HD tho).

link|improve this question
55% accept rate
feedback

closed as exact duplicate by quack quixote Jun 20 '10 at 7:03

This question covers exactly the same ground as earlier questions on this topic; its answers may be merged with another identical question. See the FAQ for guidance on how to improve it.

2 Answers

up vote 0 down vote

There are lots of apps for this; don't bother writing one yourself. To completely wipe the HDD, you'll have to do it at boot, or the program would overwrite itself. Here's one program which says it'll "nuke" the hard drive.

Depends how sensitive your data is though. If there's nothing special on there, I'd just reformat it. If it's really sensitive stuff, you have to flip and randomize the bits a few times I hear, or literally light the disk on fire.

link|improve this answer
feedback
up vote 0 down vote

Take a look at Darik's Boot And Nuke

link|improve this answer
Mark beat me to it, I missed his link before I posted. – Pulse Jun 20 '10 at 6:56
feedback

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.