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I have a boring task at work to wipe 15 computer hard drives.
The bases are compaq ipaq PIII 500 mini tower darlicks.

No cdrom or floppy disk, so I'm physically removing the hard disk
and formating etc that way.

Does anyone know if its possible to blitz the drives by connecting these
Ipaqs to a network and sending a format command over Lan
from a XP / 2000 system.

Just a thought -

Jim wrote:
> I have a boring task at work to wipe 15 computer hard drives.
> The bases are compaq ipaq PIII 500 mini tower darlicks.
>
> No cdrom or floppy disk, so I'm physically removing the hard disk
> and formating etc that way.
>
> Does anyone know if its possible to blitz the drives by connecting
> these Ipaqs to a network and sending a format command over Lan
> from a XP / 2000 system.
>
> Just a thought -

What's the OS?

--
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.

System is Xp pro




>> What's the OS?
>
> --
> Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.

Jim wrote:
>>>
>>> I have a boring task at work to wipe 15 computer hard drives.
>>> The bases are compaq ipaq PIII 500 mini tower darlicks.
>>>
>>> No cdrom or floppy disk, so I'm physically removing the hard disk
>>> and formating etc that way.
>>>
>>> Does anyone know if its possible to blitz the drives by connecting these
>>> Ipaqs to a network and sending a format command over Lan
>>> from a XP / 2000 system.
>>
>> What's the OS?
>
> System is Xp pro
>
Please don't remove the message contents when you reply. And when a reply is
posted a the bottom (like, sequential order) continue to post replies at the
bottom. This isn't email, it's Usenet.

Okay - that rant aside, I *know* what your LAN is running. What OS was/is on
the PIII 500MHz mini towers? Surely not XP Pro...

--
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.

Howdy!

"Toolman Tim" <> wrote in message
news:VmZSe.3395$...

>
> Okay - that rant aside, I *know* what your LAN is running. What OS was/is
on
> the PIII 500MHz mini towers? Surely not XP Pro...

Surely quite possibly - a lot of the iPaq "Legacy-Free PCs" (not to
be confused with the iPaq Hand Held PC) were shipped with XP Pro. Don't
scream too loudly - I'm putting Pro on some P2-233s for one library to get
group policies.

The method the OP is using is just about the only way, unless he has
the USB floppy drive and a bootable Win98 diskette to FDISK the disks with.
Since last I checked, that piece of "stuff" was about 187USD from Compaq ...
and generics didn't work quite as well for Win98 ... I'd presume he doesn't.

RwP

"Toolman Tim" <> wrote in message
news:VmZSe.3395$...
> Jim wrote:
>>>>
>>>> I have a boring task at work to wipe 15 computer hard drives.
>>>> The bases are compaq ipaq PIII 500 mini tower darlicks.
>>>>
>>>> No cdrom or floppy disk, so I'm physically removing the hard disk
>>>> and formating etc that way.
>>>>
>>>> Does anyone know if its possible to blitz the drives by connecting
>>>> these Ipaqs to a network and sending a format command over Lan
>>>> from a XP / 2000 system.
>>>
>>> What's the OS?
>>
>> System is Xp pro
>>
> Please don't remove the message contents when you reply. And when a reply
> is posted a the bottom (like, sequential order) continue to post replies
> at the bottom. This isn't email, it's Usenet.
>
> Okay - that rant aside, I *know* what your LAN is running. What OS was/is
> on the PIII 500MHz mini towers? Surely not XP Pro...
>
> --
> Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
Ok, thanks for advising on the response side of things - The systems are Nt
/ 2000

>

Jim wrote:
> "Toolman Tim" <> wrote in message
> news:VmZSe.3395$...
>> Jim wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> I have a boring task at work to wipe 15 computer hard drives.
>>>>> The bases are compaq ipaq PIII 500 mini tower darlicks.
>>>>>
>>>>> No cdrom or floppy disk, so I'm physically removing the hard disk
>>>>> and formating etc that way.
>>>>>
>>>>> Does anyone know if its possible to blitz the drives by connecting
>>>>> these Ipaqs to a network and sending a format command over Lan
>>>>> from a XP / 2000 system.
>>>>
>>>> What's the OS?
>>>
>>> System is Xp pro
>>>
>> Please don't remove the message contents when you reply. And when a
>> reply is posted a the bottom (like, sequential order) continue to
>> post replies at the bottom. This isn't email, it's Usenet.
>>
>> Okay - that rant aside, I *know* what your LAN is running. What OS
>> was/is on the PIII 500MHz mini towers? Surely not XP Pro...
>>
>> --
>> Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
> Ok, thanks for advising on the response side of things - The systems
> are Nt / 2000

Sure - that helps keep things in a conversational format and easier for
others to follow as they jump in. RWP posted what I was going to suggest
too - a USB floppy disk. But that would only work if the BIOS of the iPaq
will boot from USB devices. They sound a bit aged, and I doubt that they
will.

Instead, I'd suggest a bootable CDROM and a spare CD drive- like a live
Linux distro (I use Knoppix Live CD for this). Sure, you have to open the
case still, but you temporarily connect the CD Drive to the IDE bus, boot
from that, use the software on the Linux CD to repartition/reformat the
hard drive.

If you are worried about security - needing a REAL erase, not just a basic
one, you could download and create a bootable DBAN CD and use that. But a
DOD level erase isn't quick...it's the kind of thing you'd start in the
morning each day on a different system <g>
Darik's Boot and Nuke: http://dban.sourceforge.net/


--
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.

Toolman Tim wrote:
> Jim wrote:
>> "Toolman Tim" <> wrote in message
>> news:VmZSe.3395$...
>>> Jim wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I have a boring task at work to wipe 15 computer hard drives.
>>>>>> The bases are compaq ipaq PIII 500 mini tower darlicks.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> No cdrom or floppy disk, so I'm physically removing the hard disk
>>>>>> and formating etc that way.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Does anyone know if its possible to blitz the drives by
>>>>>> connecting these Ipaqs to a network and sending a format command
>>>>>> over Lan from a XP / 2000 system.
>>>>>
>>>>> What's the OS?
>>>>
>>>> System is Xp pro
>>>>
>>> Please don't remove the message contents when you reply. And when a
>>> reply is posted a the bottom (like, sequential order) continue to
>>> post replies at the bottom. This isn't email, it's Usenet.
>>>
>>> Okay - that rant aside, I *know* what your LAN is running. What OS
>>> was/is on the PIII 500MHz mini towers? Surely not XP Pro...
>>>
>>> --
>>> Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.
>> Ok, thanks for advising on the response side of things - The systems
>> are Nt / 2000
>
> Sure - that helps keep things in a conversational format and easier
> for others to follow as they jump in. RWP posted what I was going to
> suggest too - a USB floppy disk. But that would only work if the BIOS
> of the iPaq will boot from USB devices. They sound a bit aged, and I
> doubt that they will.
>
> Instead, I'd suggest a bootable CDROM and a spare CD drive- like a
> live Linux distro (I use Knoppix Live CD for this). Sure, you have to
> open the case still, but you temporarily connect the CD Drive to the
> IDE bus, boot from that, use the software on the Linux CD to
> repartition/reformat the hard drive.
>
> If you are worried about security - needing a REAL erase, not just a
> basic one, you could download and create a bootable DBAN CD and use
> that. But a DOD level erase isn't quick...it's the kind of thing
> you'd start in the morning each day on a different system <g>
> Darik's Boot and Nuke: http://dban.sourceforge.net/

Another thought along the temporary IDE hookup line is a small extra HD -
bootable, put NT on it, hook *that* up to the iPaqs and use the NT disk
management tools to erase the HD. (Everyone has an extra HD sitting around,
don't they? <g>)

--
Madness takes its toll. Please have exact change.

On Mon, 5 Sep 2005 15:28:19 +0100, "Jim" <> wrote:

>I have a boring task at work to wipe 15 computer hard drives.
>The bases are compaq ipaq PIII 500 mini tower darlicks.
>
>No cdrom or floppy disk, so I'm physically removing the hard disk
>and formating etc that way.

A whole 15???

****, that would keep you in work for at least a day

jd