Wiping a Hard Drive

This is like what do you do in Denver when you're dead....

Anyone know a practical, effective way to erase a hard drive that is deader
than a brick? It's a West. Digital 60 gig 7200 RPM. It won't spin up and
WD's diagnostic utilities won't recognize it. It went out a few days before
the warranty expired and I want to try to return it, but it has _lots_ of
sensitive info on it, and, dead or not, I don't want it in the hands of
strangers.

By practical, I mean something accessible to the average bozo, like me.
Running it thru an MRI scanner might be worth a try, but not too practical.

Thanks!

Mike

 

Maybe you can revive it long enough to get the data off it.
http://techrepublic.com.com/5100-6255-5029761.html

 

If the info is so sensitive I would use a large hammer on it, and then just
buy a new drive.

 

That's a possibility, but I would rather have the company that sold me a
weak, defective product replace it. Hence asking for an effective way to
wipe it.

 

melt it? or cut it in half--or into several pieces with something.

 

I can understand that, but sometimes peace of mind is worth a few
bucks.......

 

Set it on one big ass magnet for about two hours.

 

dont think so!

if you ever open up a hard drive you'll find a nice strong magnet
already sitting right next to the platters!

 

We use one all the time Jason...its the same magnet we use to erase DIGI
tapes of our phone system...works great on harddrives...they gat a little
hot after sitting there.

 

Hey Barry, you've got the answer. All he has to do is take it up to the
hospital and run it through the MRI!!!

AG

 

You got that right.
An MRI will even blank the strip on the back of your credit and ATM cards.

 

They probably were. It may take a big magnet to erase a hard drive but
only a few bits in the right place need to be screwed up to give a
computer fits.
Thumper
To reply drop XYZ in address

 

I bet a magnetic sledge hammer would work. ;-)

 

I've tried both microwave oven magnets and external CRT degaussing
coils on floppies...nothing got erased initially. I never went back to
check, say, three months later, though.

Tom

 

I haven't read it yet, but it showed up in my e-mail within the last
day or two...

informit.com

Make Your Data Go Away: Hard Drive Shredders to the Rescue

I get the impression that it's not published on their site; it's in
HTML format also, and I think it's just a newsletter (one of the many
I receive but can't get a chance to read them). Just an FYI...

Tom

 

I'll tell you what will erase floppies in large numbers, even to the
point that a Track Zero Bad, Disk Unusable message is reversed...a
bulk video tape eraser in a TV station. I personally think that a HDD
would be unphased (sorry for the bad and unintentional pun here)
though.
Tom

 

hey, tom,

yeah, it's on their site. here:
http://www.informit.com/articles/printerfriendly.asp?p=349882 .

it lead me to other sites where i discovered that they now have shredders
for hard drives. cut 'em up, chop 'em up and spit 'em out in particles.
might try to get a job in one of those places.

it looks like the only possibility would be a bulk tape eraser - i thought
maybe a degausser would do it, but from what you and others said ( yours was
actually empirical, always better) that won't do it.

thanks to all who replied. recap - the drive is dead, it won't spin, hence
software is useless. i discovered it;s death a couple days before the
warranty ran out. after about increasingly irate eight emails, got an RMA.
but then became paranoid about the data on the drive.

it failed sometime before i discovered it. it was the slave on the primary
channel in a computer that works fine, and it's function was to support 4
operating systems in a lab. because it was big enough to do that easily, i
just left the data from previous use on it. (lesson for me and all - don't
do that.) i did that because i have -personally- had good luck with drives.
I have a couple that are ten years old, have sat for half a decade, and
still work. This one sat for three months and failed. Western Digital. My
last.
on methods - kenny's link to 200 ways to revive your drive - was great.
thanks! i had already tried most of them. have finally slammed it on the
floor - and that didn't work. have tried what barry calls the radial twist,
as good a name as any, many times: it didn't work. i have from the
beginning been pretty sure it's a dead chip on the controller board - which
means that a thief in the receiving room at the return mail room could get
it running again by screwing on an old controller board.

unfortuneately, i can't get a replacement on a credit card and swap boards
without violating the warranty, if they happen to look at it.

now, just to clear up a myth, taking the cover off a drive rarely destroys
it. it will introduce stuff that will ruin the drive over time, but i have
pulled old drives out of boxes, taken the covers off to show students what
they looked like inside, put the covers back on, stuck them into a machine,
booted them up finding windows 3.1, and examined the data on the drives.
just to show it could be done. it can be done, and for security purposes
don't forget that.

breaking the platters will work. you can still get data, but no casual or
even professional thief would have the necessary equipment, or the desire to
look for it. so that's probably what i'll do, and forgoe the replacement.

tis truly a bite in the ass. i've had personal even intimate experience
with about 8 WD drives. three of them failed early. i would like WD bear
some of the cost. but my only possible access to a bulk tape eraser is a
friend in a radio station 450 miles away, not a feasible trip right now, and
not cost effective in any case. and his station may not even have one any
more....

if anyone knows of possible access to a bulk tape eraser in the philadelphia
area (south east pennsylvania / south jersey) please let me know at
wallacestevens at usa com. symbols and dots in the
appropriate places.

thanks for all the answers, even those that suggested hitting it with a
hammer.

mike flinn

 

p.s

hat will ruin the drive over time, but i have
pulled old drives out of boxes

by boxes i mean real boxes: old, open, cardboard boxes with everyting inside
covered with dust, not the metaphor for computers.

sorry for the lack of clarity.

pop quiz: metaphor, simile. what's the diference?

 

They're types of soda pop?

Seriously, without looking it up...I don't know. I wonder if a
Thesaurus would list them together, or if they're different enough for
this not to happen.

Tom

 

I'm not from the "Show Me" state, but I often act like it.

Tom