www.killdisk.com

[HamHam]

I currently have some old computers I was planning on selling or donating. At one point they may have had some important information on them. I was planning on reformating them but I have lost the OS cd ( Dell Windows XP) and the driver disc ( dont want to hunt dell.com to get them all, I have 4 old computers will all different specs). I found this site, http://www.killdisk.com/eraser.htm , which states its program will erase data on unused portions of a harddrive, without the need of reformatting (keep the OS in tact). Has anyone tried or heard anything about this program?


Straight from their site.

"What?s new in version 5.0 (Windows application):

New Wipe function that wipes out all unused space on existing drives, not touching existing data.
Professional package now includes Windows Vista-based Bootable Disk Creator that allows you to boot Windows Vista from CD/DVD/USB, and to erase or wipe out your disks in Windows environment. USB Plug'n'Play devices are supported.
The FREE application can be registered with a registration key without "


Thanks

Hamilton

 

[mechBgon]

If you want to overwrite the free space on the drives, you could simply use cipher.

1) put the disk into a WinXP Pro system, or a Vista Business/Ultimate system. If the disk is already in an XP Pro or Vista Business/Ultimate system, you're all set.

2) determine what drive letter the drive ended up with. Let's say it got G:.

3) open a command-line window with Start > Run > cmd, and run the command

cipher /wG:\ (note that there is no space between the /w switch and the drive letter G:\)

The free space on the disk will be overwritten three times with EFS-encrypted garbage data, then blanked. Existing files will be left alone.

 

[KeithP]

I don't know anything about that particular program but you might also want to check out Eraser.

-KeithP

 

[Zugzwang152]

Cipher.exe is your best bet here.

Depending how old it is, you may want to contact Dell for a replacement disc. I've contacted them twice for replacement discs for machines well out of warranty, and they sent it out no problem both times for free. Kudos to them for a little bit of customer service. People can say what they want, I've never been hassled by Dell tech support :thumbsup:

The most secure option would be to DBAN that sucker and intsall a fresh copy of windows.