Old PC equipment

[Murphyv310]

I've seen so many times recent desktop PCs at the council dump, I even retrieved a dell all in one desktop that actually worked when I got it home, it even had an 80 gb hdd installed and asked for a password on booting up. I was shocked and horrified when I saw it was from a doctors surgery (ran a Linux live disc). Needless to say I put the hammer through the HDD, that pc lasted me for three or four years till I bought a refurbished Dell from CPC.

Judy's brother has a masters degree and doctorate in
psychology all done without a PC, something that we take for granted these days, we just don't realise how lucky we are here.

[Richard_FM]

I had an IBM PS/1 which my Dad bought for the family in 1991 & was still working when I disposed of it in 2004.

I wanted to keep it but a design quirk was having the power supply in the monitor, I kept the HDD as it had confidential information on, it's still around somewhere.

[ppppenguin]

But do you have anything that can read the old HDD? If you don't want to keep the data the easiest thing to do is open the HDD, take out the platter and bend it in half. That puts any data well beyond anyone except the spooks and they would need to be desperate to attempt even a partial recovery.

[Refugee]

If you want to get rid of data on an old HDD just put it on a fire and allow it to heat up until the alloy parts have melted.

[Murphyv310]

Hi Ref.
I'd have to light a BBQ as I don't have a fireplace etc. Two blows with the sledgehammer did the trick for me!

[BusyBee]

Where I worked it was usually a drill bit straight through the case and disk.

Tracy

[ppppenguin]

Should be good enough to deter all but the spooks but it leaves much of the platter intact.

[Murphyv310]

SSDs will be easier to destroy either a small hammer or 30 seconds in the microwave

[Nick]

In my professional life I've had forensic recovery done on disks and mobile phones.

Not cheap, but you'll be amazed what can be got back from the most damaged equipment...

When disposing of drives, we have them granulated by industrial grinders - one of our staff accompanies the drives at all times and watches them being put in the grinder.

Personally, I have shot drives with a 12g, which wad actually no that easy to do.

[ppppenguin]

The level of security you need is proportionate to the risk. If it's your own files, including all the slightly naughty things that you never downloaded, I'm sure that folding the platter in half will be enough. Forensic recovery is non-trivial and only done when really needed by the spooks, commercial interests or law enforcement.

I think that heating the platter past curie point is guaranteed but I'm not 100% sure. Part of the problem is knowing that you've actually reached the temperature throughout the platter.

As for software solutions, simply writing all zeros to every sector of a modern HDD should defeat all but forensic recovery. Older HDDs with less dense data may need better methods.

I don't know what counts as reliable data erasure for SSDs. I don't know if the methods described here are secure: https://www.wepc.com/how-to/securely-era...ssd-drive/