How to wipe an external hd?

So, having finally gotten my replacement DV2500t up and running with all of my defunct DV1000's important programs and information, it's time to wipe the old laptop's drive clean and send the broken DV1000 back to HP.

Now, I've reformatted/wiped my main laptop HD a few times and have the general idea of how everything works. But I'm a little confused on how I'd wipe the DV1000's drive, which is currently being used as an external USB HD.

How exactly does one go about wiping an external HD? I'm sure this is a silly question, but I don't want to do anything until I'm sure I won't wipe the wrong drive or something equally stupid. Thanks for the help!

 

right click on the drive in computer and select format...

 

You should just be able to do it through Windows as if you were wiping a floppy disk. I've done it with my portable hard disk (similar situation too, its from my old HP ze4281) many times. Just make sure you pick NTFS file system otherwise it might get annoying if you're storing large files (FAT32 will only handle up to 4gb file size)

Grand Admiral

 

Or you can try this: http://dban.sourceforge.net/

But you'd be better off with what the other guys said. The method I suggested would take too long and is mainly for wiping private information, preventing anyone from ever seeing it.

 

I figured as much, just wanted to make sure before I pulled the trigger. Thanks guys!

 

When you format a drive everything can still be retrieved if you have the right tools. I work in the computer forensic industry and if I were to come across a drive that was only formatted I would be able to retrieve everything off of the drive. To securely erase everything on a hard drive you need to "wipe" the drive. Wiping consists of writing 0's or 1's to your entire hard drive which will overwrite the data on it. When you format it isn't doing anything to the data, it is simply deleting the MFT of the file system so any Operating system looking at the hard drive will think it is blank.

Some scientists have done tests, and even if you wipe a hard drive multiple times, if you have a electron microscope you can still retrieve the data, but these microscopes cost a hundred grand or more.

I just thought you all would be interested in this information. If you still want to securely wipe your hard drive send me an email and I'll direct you to a few programs.

 

If you format a drive isn't all the private info wiped also

 

No it isn't. If you read my post above yours you will see that info is still retrievable if you only format your drive. You aren't wiping anything when you format a drive, you are just blowing away the MFT (Master File Table) of the file system, which holds all the information of what files are stored on the hard drive and where. Formatting does nothing else, so all your data is still resident on the Hard Drive, and if you have forensics tools you can retrieve the info. The only way to truly be secure about it is by using a wiping program, which will overwrite every single sector on the hard drive with 0's or 1's, whichever you set it to.

 

You all might be interested in my "Cleaning Free Space On Disk Drives" guide in my sig.

 

After learning that formating the drive wouldn't actually destroy the data on it, I ended up going with a disk eraser program to make sure everything was wiped. I highly doubt anyone's going to go through the trouble of trying to get my info, and as far as personal information goes the HD wasn't chock full of it, but it never hurts to be careful. Thanks again for the info!

 

This isn't really feasible because once you get down to the level, there's no way to tell which molecules belong to what "overwrite" of the data that you are looking for. There's also no physical tracks that one could follow, like on a CD, that make it obvious where the tracks are. It's the sort of thing that makes for good TV on CSI, but is better treated like an urban myth.

Recovering data with this method would take years with even highly trained technicians doing this type of recovery, and even then it's likely not possible. Unless your data is worth billions of dollars to large governments, don't worry about it.

 

Here's one place to read if anybody is interested in learning more:

http://www.digitalissues.co.uk/html/os/misc/shred.html

 

I was simply stating a fact, that it is possible to retrieve overwritten data. I didn't bother going into specifics because it would take far too long, and if people really wanted to know more they can look at the website and google it.