Jim,

If you use the FDISK utility to delete the primary partition, then recreate
it, and reformat your drive, it should be as thoroughly wiped as if you use
a magnet.  FDISK removes the start of disk information, so the reformatted
drive is completely overwritten in the process.

Denis Anson, MS, OTR/L
Assistant Professor
College Misericordia
301 Lake St.
Dallas, PA 18612
 

-----Original Message-----
From: * EASI: Equal Access to Software & Information
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Jim Rebman
Sent: Tuesday, January 30, 2001 9:54 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: securely formatting hard drive?

Folks,

I need a little advice that is not directly related to assistive tech, so
if somebody who has some info for me could mail me off-list with this, I
would appreciate it.

My laptop is about to die and I have ordered a new one and I am trading in
the old one and need to find a way to ensure that the hard drive is
securely formatted with no possibility of somebody being able to recover
any data from it.

Does anybody know how to do this, or if there is some kind of utility I can
try?

Thanks,

Jim

---------------------------
James A. Rebman

Cognitive Levers Project
Center for Life-Long Learning and Design (L3D)
University of Colorado, Boulder

"In times of change, the learners will inherit the earth, while the learned
will find themselves beautifully equipped for a world that no longer
exists."
- Eric Hoffer