[mattmarshall]

hey all

what's the best way to fully erase a drive? i'm going to sell one, and don't want the buyer to be able to "recover' my old files.

any tips?

thanks

- matt

[angelmb]

Disk Utility is your friend, select the hard disk you want to delete, and then go to Erase, clic on Options and choose the option "8 way Random Write Format".

Another option is to wait until Tiger, I read that the same option is improved and let you delete the hard disk over 30 times !!!

[Mojo]

If you want to be extra careful without spending money on a third-party app, delete sensitive files using the Finder's Secure Empty Trash command, then do the above steps. Your data will be over-written so many times that nobody will be able to recover it.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by angelmb

Disk Utility is your friend, select the hard disk you want to delete, and then go to Erase, clic on Options and choose the option "8 way Random Write Format".

Another option is to wait until Tiger, I read that the same option is improved and let you delete the hard disk over 30 times !!!

Only if you have enough time:

http://forums.macnn.com/69/mac-notebooks/252611/help-ibook-hd-formatting-going-three/



-t

[zigzag]

This guy knows as much about drive security as anyone and says a single overwrite is all you need:

"[T]here is no unclassified evidence that data on a modern hard drive can be recovered after it has been overwritten with just a single pass of random information. Some have made such claims, but no such recovery has ever been demonstrated in public. Today's hard drives are specifically designed not to work that way."

http://www.csoonline.com/read/040103/machine.html

[King_Rat]

Originally Posted by zigzag

"[T]here is no unclassified evidence..."

But wait! What if the CIA is after his data?

[mattmarshall]

so wait -- is the other disk utilty option ("write zero's") a 1x over-write?

- matt

[zigzag]

Originally Posted by mattmarshall

so wait -- is the other disk utilty option ("write zero's") a 1x over-write?

- matt

I'm not sure - since it's just zeros, it might not qualify as random, but I would be comfortable using it. Unless, of course, you're expecting the CIA to try to recover data from your drive.

[subego]

Originally Posted by King_Rat

But wait! What if the CIA is after his data?

If you ask very nicely, I'm sure the CIA will come and erase the drive for you.

In fact they're doing it right now.

Fnord.