computer washing

[AdamZ]

Well not really washing it!

I have a Dell Precision 340 Desk top coumputer with mouse and keyboard from my firm. ( no screen). It has been sitting under my desk for a few years so I plugged it in to see what it had.

Pentium 4
2.00 GHz
523,780 KB RAM

its loaded with some decent stuff like

Windows 2000
MS Office Professional
and some law firm and aviation specific programs.

Anyway I thought about donating it. My wife works in a school and some of the kids don't have computers at home and I thought she might be able to give it to one of the kids. It can hook up to the net and they can use Word to do reports etc. Kind of help them keep up.

HOWEVER I really really would need to be sure that all of the Data on the HD was permanently deleted since it was once my work computer.

Questions;

1) Is this old box even worth giving away at all

2) If so how do I accomplish my goal of total deletion of Data without trashing the HD. The computer will be worthless to these kids if the HD is removed.

Thanks

 

[mikea]

You'll need the original disks the PC came with to replace Windows, unless you want to give it to the kids with Ubuntu Linux, which will work fine. Windows will not be happy with 512KB of RAM.

Burn a wipe disk to CD and boot on it wipe the hard drive and install/reinstall the OS from CD. http://www.dban.org/download

You can install ubuntu from a boot CD or a USB thumb drive.
http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop/get-ubuntu/download

Note that you have to burn the CD image file, not just copy it to make the CDs. If you don't have burning program like Nero or Roxio use IMGBURN http://www.imgburn.com/

I just revived an old laptop with 1GB RAM and splurged $35 (family 3 pack) for a new copy of Windows 7. It works fine.

No matter which OS you install allow up to a few hours afterwards to connect it and let it get software updates.

 

[zaitcev]

I just revived an old laptop with 1GB RAM and splurged $35 (family 3 pack) for a new copy of Windows 7. It works fine.

This is amazingly cheap, where did you get it?

 

[Ghery]

No drives leave my employer. If they donate a computer there is no drive in it. Paranoia are us.

 

[JesseD]

No drives leave my employer. If they donate a computer there is no drive in it. Paranoia are us.

Agreed, but for home users, Active Killdisk works pretty good. Do at least 3 passes and you'll probably make it more time consuming than it's worth to recover the data. Unless you're the CEO of a big company, it's easier to steal mail to get access to false credit. Remember, most thieves are lazy.

 

[RJM62]

For all practical purposes, three wipes or more will do the trick. I personally use DBAN, but there are other bootable utilities that are just as good. Active Killdisk has already been mentioned, and I know some guys in the business who like E-Maxx.

If you're really bored or have due diligence concerns, this is the closest thing to an "official" standard that I'm aware of. It's also a pretty good example of why taxes are so high...

-Rich

 

[mikea]

This is amazingly cheap, where did you get it?

From Microsoft.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/bu....aspx?ef_id=XGhNhW2N9nsAAEPh:20110322213939:s 3-pack $149.

I meant $35 per copy. I got the free Cisco Valet router and sold to to a neighbor for $50, so it amounts to around $35 per with shipping and tax.

Sorry.

 

[mikea]

Agreed, but for home users, Active Killdisk works pretty good. Do at least 3 passes and you'll probably make it more time consuming than it's worth to recover the data. Unless you're the CEO of a big company, it's easier to steal mail to get access to false credit. Remember, most thieves are lazy.

For all practical purposes, three wipes or more will do the trick. I personally use DBAN, but there are other bootable utilities that are just as good. ...

It's nonsense to think that most with ill intent would try to recover from even a full disk format. It's certainly beyond the skills of anybody at Geek Squad.

Using any wiper will make data recovery more difficult than anything you had is worth. There are plenty of easy pickin's unerased hard drives to be had.

 

[RJM62]

It's nonsense to think that most with ill intent would try to recover from even a full disk format. It's certainly beyond the skills of anybody at Geek Squad.

Using any wiper will make data recovery more difficult than anything you had is worth. There are plenty of easy pickin's unerased hard drives to be had.

But Adam's a lawyer. The consequences if anyone did manage to recover his files could end his career.

But yeah, even a single pass with random binary garbage would make the chances of software-based recovery very unlikely. Three passes, virtually impossible. More than that, a waste of time, in my opinion. (My apologies to Peter Guttman.)

-Rich

 

[poadeleted20]

Well not really washing it!

Good, because even I know that putting a computer in the washing machine is a real bad idea.

That said, I seem to remember Norton Utilities having a really effective disk erasing routine. And I also remember from a bad experience that reloading the basic operating system renders all data on the drive irretrievable.

 

[RJM62]

Good, because even I know that putting a computer in the washing machine is a real bad idea.

That said, I seem to remember Norton Utilities having a really effective disk erasing routine. And I also remember from a bad experience that reloading the basic operating system renders all data on the drive irretrievable.

Not usually, Ron. In most cases, it just makes it invisible to the operating system (and hence, to the user and applications). Some of it will generally be overwritten in the process of an OS reinstall, but that which isn't overwritten can usually be recovered fairly easily. This is a very common data recovery job.

An ordinary format doesn't render data irretrievable. Deleting a partition or the partition table doesn't render data irretrievable. Short of physically destroying the drive, the only way to make data irretrievable is to overwrite it with new data. An OS reinstall will incidentally overwrite some data, but the data residing in what will be "free space" on the new install will usually be recoverable.

That's what disk-wiping tools do. They overwrite the data with new data, most commonly ones, zeros, pseudorandom garbage, the output of some mathematical formula or algorithm selected by the user, or some combination of these in multiple passes.

My late friend and data-recovery maven Stefan used to comment on how often he came across pictures and other data owned by the previous owners of "factory-refurbished" computers owned by his clients. In the process of "refurbishing" these machines, the manufacturers didn't even bother to do a low-level format on the hard drives. As a result, their data was recoverable even after a standard format, an OS reinstall, and and the sale to and use of the computer by a new owner.

-Rich