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    Returning 1330 laptop: How to clear personal info?

    Discussion in 'Dell' started by Simic, Jan 10, 2008.

  1. Simic

    Simic Notebook Consultant

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    I am returning a 1330 (running Vista pre-SP1) that I've used at work for about a week. In that time I've installed a number of audio programs, firefox and a few other things like OpenOffice. I obviously know how to uninstall programs and remove personal documents and the like, but is there any recommended procedure to remove other less obvious personal or confidential artifacts from the laptop before returning it? Thanks.
     
    Simic, Jan 10, 2008
    #1
  2. huynhc

    huynhc Notebook Consultant

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    did it come with a quickrestore dvd? if so pop that in and format the comp...
     
    huynhc, Jan 10, 2008
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  3. Acorn

    Acorn Notebook Evangelist

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    System restore to the original date you got your pc, i think that deletes everything. Download Ccleaner, clean everything.
     
    Acorn, Jan 10, 2008
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  4. bmwrob

    bmwrob Notebook Virtuoso

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    If you want to seriously clean your machine in order to maintain all your secrets, LOL, you'll need to wipe your drive, not just do a reformat. DBan is the best product I've used, but there are others, including KillDisk.

    If you don't have anything of real importance on your drive, like banking info, SSAN, stolen State secrets, etc, a reformat and reinstall of Windows should suffice.
     
    bmwrob, Jan 10, 2008
    #4
  5. Lithus

    Lithus NBR Janitor

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    You don't even need to reinstall. Pop in the Windows disc, format the drive, and done. It'll save you an hour.
     
    Lithus, Jan 10, 2008
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  6. enzoshadow

    enzoshadow Notebook Enthusiast

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    Yup! I just format the whole drive and send them back an empty drive. Most likely they will reformate it either way, so just save the trouble.
     
    enzoshadow, Jan 11, 2008
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  7. BlackRussian

    BlackRussian Notebook Deity

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    Even if you format the drive they can still recover info on the drive...very easy
    Just download the free version of active@kill Hard Drive Eraser it better then doing a format... http://www.killdisk.com
     
    BlackRussian, Jan 11, 2008
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  8. Relativity17

    Relativity17 Notebook Evangelist

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    Realistically, Dell has better things to do than read through your OOO documents. Once the machine gets to them, the hard drive will probably be stripped out, blanked, and re-imaged.
     
    Relativity17, Jan 11, 2008
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  9. praneeth

    praneeth Sanath Jaya Suriya!!!

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    I agree. The techs at Dell reformat and put everything in there the way it was in the beginning. Everything above is kind of overkill I think.
     
    praneeth, Jan 11, 2008
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