I am not sure if you call it cleaning or just getting things off of your hard drive. We are deleting programs and all information that I have on it. Can I trust no one will get into the information on it or should I keep trying to get it all off? I was going to give it to someone but after thinking about it, what good would it do with no programs on it? I can just pay to junk it but I would really like to know if the hard drive is empty. Just personal information, we kept medical files on it and budgets, no banking or anything like that but the suze orman program might have a social security # in it...can't remember for sure.. Would it be best to just take the side off and destroy things inside or is it dangerous to do that? We know nothing about doing it..of course it would be unplugged for sure. any tips will be appreciated. I love windows 7....so far I think it is great.
Hi Sherry8, I think this is a good site to get further info on your subject and yes many people do refer to it as cleaning. http://www.microsoft.com/business/smb/en-au/harddrive.mspx I personally had gone thru a couple of hard drives and I don't store important info in them. But then again computer is becoming more and more a part of our daily life and personal confidential information will definitely get into the hard drive some how or other ........ come to think of it I do have some confidential info in my hard drive My rule is very simple for my used hard drive, if it is dead err...I mean broken I will dismantle it, send the circuit board to recyclers, break the disc and use the magnets in my car oil filter to hold back the iron filing in the oil filter to make sure it does not go back into the engine to cause further wear and tear. The magnets are really powerful and the way it is shaped it fits right on a car oil filter casing. For those that are still working I had them installed as a secondary hard drive for backup purpose and data storage. If you do not want to install it as a secondary hard drive you can get a casing and use it as a external hard drive. 8) Finally as for the remaining part of the hardware you can give it away without the hard drive or install a pre-owned hard drive from a second hand dealer. You can even sell it on the internet cause I am sure there are looking for parts to cannibalize :idea: I guess by doing that you can be sure of whatever private and confidential info in your hard drive will be with you.
Sherry, I can tell you what was done to the laptops at the Fortune 500 company I used to work for. Our tech person would take out the hard drive and smash it with a hammer. With all of the technical expertise that we had, it was felt that the best way was to physically destroy it.
KK ng....and Karen.... thank you so much for the information, I think the easiest thing to do is take it apart and smash it. I worry about it if I would give it to someone and then they give it to someone else. The social security number was put into a program so I am not sure if they could get in or not but with all the computer smart people, I don't want to take a chance. Thank you again...
yea, there are certain programs that can recover deleted data, so someone who knows his/her way around a computer could find what you are deleting. The only way to be sure that files are permanently deleted from a hard drive is to write something else on the hard drive after deleting it. this will ensure that all information is physically gone from the hard drive.
