Format THOROUGHLY 1

[kwunder]

I've heard that a simple format c: at the dos prompt doesn't actually REMOVE all data.

1) Is this correct ?
2) How can you actually THOROUGHLY wipe a HDD if this info is correct ?

Reason I ask is that I am selling my HDD, and after using Norton's Wipe Info (From within Norton System Works 2002) on some MS Money files, I was alarmed to find that Norton Un-Erase (Also from within Norton System Works 2002) was able to recover them, despite doing a 7 pass wipe on them !!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks for any info

 

[linney]

Have a read of this thread, some of the options you have already used.

Formatting XP Disk
thread779-589687

Try formatting the disk to a different file system and see if Norton can still read the old file system data.

 

[TunaBoy57]

different file system is the way to go, in my experience. fdisk, and format the drive first as per win98 startup floppy norms.
Then I use Mandrake Linux 8 or later,from a full install cd, to completely format that whole drive as ext2, I then play around with linux (always interesting), in order to spread files all over the drive. then I uninstall the things I've put on. then pop the old win98se floppy in, fdisk, format and feed it Win98. Then fdisk, leave the disk with a created, but unformatted partition. Turn it off. Then on the next install of either win98, or Win Xp, during which I let setup format the drive, none of my lowlevel bit searches turn up any comprehensible files. Long process I know, about the same as any good lowlevel format, but at least I get to play a couple of things in another os in the middle.

 

[kwunder]

Long yeh, but something to try all the same.
Thanks

kwunder

 

[MattWray]

You need to get something to perform a low-level format. This will completely wipe all data from the disk. I know Tech TV's website had a free one a while back. Don't remember what it was called, sorry...

Thanks,

Matt Wray
MCSE, MCSA, MCP, CCNA

http://www.sss-steel.com

 

[kwunder]

Tech TV ?

Do you know the site address ?

Thanks !
kwunder

 

[MattWray]

Here's the link to the story...

http://www.techtv.com/screensavers/answerstips/story/0,24330,2563422,00.html

Thanks,

Matt Wray
MCSE, MCSA, MCP, CCNA

http://www.sss-steel.com

 

[kwunder]

Thanks for the link Matt. I've d/l BCWipe and I'll try it out A.S.A.P.

Thanks again
BW
ARPS, LRPS, FRPS P-)

 

[eddie2]

I just went through this and after numerous false starts I found the only way to wipe the HD was to create a startup or boot floppy in windows 98 0r 95. (Make a boot floppy on a 98 machine.) Then insert this in your XP machine and do a C:\format/s. eddie2

 

[battmain]

Reason I ask is that I am selling my HDD, and after using Norton's Wipe Info (From within Norton System Works 2002) on some MS Money files, I was alarmed to find that Norton Un-Erase (Also from within Norton System Works 2002) was able to recover them, despite doing a 7 pass wipe on them !

Wasn't there an option/checkbox to write like 'ff' characters using the wipe function? I'll admit, it's been a while since I used Norton Systemworks since I still use some the dos utilities.

 

[kwunder]

battmain :-

Norton's WIPE INFO offers the following options:-

Fast Wipe (Write once the value of (anything the user inputs)

OR:-

Government Wipe - (DoD 5220.22-M)
Write all 1's then all 0's (user input how many times)
Then write once the value (User inputs value)
Times to perform this (user inputs value)

I HAVE IT SET TO 7 TIMES

Thanks
kwunder

 

[Freestone]

Just to be sure I understand, after using Norton's Wipe Info, Norton's Un-Erase was able to recover the files. Did you actually open the recovered files to see if the data was still intact? A wipe of a file's data is not the same as destroying a file's entry in a file system.

 

[battmain]

Fast Wipe (Write once the value of (anything the user inputs)

Ok, and are you saying that after you do this, you are still able to view the files data after? See if that's the case, then your hard drive may have write caching turned on and I could have sworn that the system works bypassed that. I've never been able to recover anything after doing any type of wipe where characters are written in place of data. And I agree with Freestone. You might be able to see the filenames in a directory listing, but if you try to file data, you might get an error. Another time I've seen this behavior is with certain type of drives, where they spoof the sector info...The utilities wont work properly with these type of drives. If you post the drive type, we might be able to point to a website to get the low lvl format utilities for it.

 

[kwunder]

Freestone :-
After recovering 7 separate files, I was able to use 2 OK.

Battmain :- It's a Western Digital Caviar 7200RPM WD400BB

Thanks guys

 

[battmain]

Try this url for Western Digital and try the data lifeguard V10. It should have the format utility in it, but I have not tried that version yet myself. I'm used to the old utilities that they had.

http://support.wdc.com/download/

 

[bobej]

There is a little documentd switch to the format command that Microsoft use to clean their units the command is /u

i.e format /u

 

[krinid]

Why is it that "format /?" doesn't turn up any info on /u but entering it in seems to work fine...? hmmmm

 

[wolluf]

kwunder - have you successfully wiped drive yet?
If not you might want to try

http://www.killdisk.com/features.htm

 

[linney]

A strong magnet was suggested in another thread.

 

[Freestone]

And perhaps Norton's technical staff would like to hear of your experience not only of recovering files, but also the data contained within 2 of the 7.