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    Recovery after factory defaults?

    Discussion in 'HP' started by hpnewbie, Apr 17, 2010.

  1. hpnewbie

    hpnewbie Notebook Enthusiast

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    Just curious, if i use the recovery disk to take my old HP to factory defaults before selling it, is it still possible for someone to use those data recovery software to pull up my old info? Is it just better to use something like dban of killdisk?
     
    hpnewbie, Apr 17, 2010
    #1
  2. KLF

    KLF NBR Super Modernator Super Moderator

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    Dban the hdd, then use recovery disc.

    If there's no recovery disc available, using some security software to wipe free space is a viable option too.
     
    KLF, Apr 17, 2010
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  3. hpnewbie

    hpnewbie Notebook Enthusiast

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    But wouldn't dban wipe out the entire HD? I thought the recovery disc only worked in conjunction with the OS stored on a secret partition on the HD.
     
    hpnewbie, Apr 18, 2010
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  4. walterdt3

    walterdt3 Notebook Consultant

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    The recovery disk should work on a completely blank drive. It doesn't need the partition. The secret partition is only for making the recovery disk or to attempt to restore to factory without the recovery disk.

    To answer your original question, just doing a restore, or for that matter, just formatting the drive, doesn't remove all you old information. Using software that writes to every part of the drive is the surist way to remove your old info.
     
    walterdt3, Apr 18, 2010
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  5. yay

    yay Notebook Consultant

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    Yes it is very possible for somehone to pull off information from your hdd even after a format. There are programs out there to do that incase of hdd faillure or if you want to recover deleted data.
     
    yay, Apr 18, 2010
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  6. KLF

    KLF NBR Super Modernator Super Moderator

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    Recovery discs basically re-create the recovery partition in case of hdd failure. If you have recovery partition available, disc itself is not needed at all.
     
    KLF, Apr 18, 2010
    #6