<html><head><meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=us-ascii"></head><body style="overflow-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; line-break: after-white-space;">Afraid not. All that does is mark the disk partitions as available for overwriting. All the data was still there for someone with a disk recovery tool.<div><br></div><div>Overwriting data securely takes a while.</div><div><br><div><br></div><div><br><div><br><blockquote type="cite"><div>On Feb 20, 2023, at 14:25, Frank Sandy <fsandy9@comcast.net> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<div>
The last time I disposed of a PC I ran, from the command prompt:<br>
<br>
Format C: /P <br>
<br>
It asked if the command should be executed on the next boot and
I responded "yes". It appeared to run as expected when I rebooted
and I assume the /P option caused it to overwrite the whole
partition. The disk was then not bootable. Am I correct that it
was fully wiped?<br>
<br>
Frank Sandy<br>
<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 2/20/2023 2:05 PM, Larry Wittig
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite="mid:CA+YQV3d8s6=WZAUOh2Qjs9BAPq3rmq3DxTY2bSczrH3pkbPFww@mail.gmail.com">
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<div dir="ltr">
<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:georgia,serif">If
you're going to bake, as I suggested,it might be good to first
remove the PCB.</div>
</div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Mon, Feb 20, 2023 at 1:59
PM Larry Wittig <<a href="mailto:9423lew@gmail.com" moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">9423lew@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div dir="ltr">
<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:georgia,serif">One
easy way to erase the HDD is to bake it in your oven --
say 400 degrees F for 1 hour.</div>
</div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Mon, Feb 20, 2023 at
1:09 PM Ted Kochanski <<a href="mailto:tedpkphd@gmail.com" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">tedpkphd@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div dir="ltr">All,
<div><br>
</div>
<div>It all depends on what is the sensitivity of the
stuff on the disk -- if it is National Security stuff
-- then crushing or grinding, melting, etc is what you
to make sure nothing can be recovered</div>
<div>I we are talking bank accounts, and such that is
far too too much effort for the reduction of risk --
there are commercial programs which do a fairly good
job</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>for example the now Infamous Bleachbit</div>
<div>from the wikipedia article</div>
<div>BleachBit is a free and open-source disk space
cleaner, privacy manager, and computer system
optimizer. The BleachBit source code is licensed under
the GNU General Public License version 3.<br>
<br>
History<br>
BleachBit was first publicly released on 24 December
2008 for Linux systems.[3] The 0.2.1 release created
some controversy[4] by suggesting Linux needed a
registry cleaner.<br>
<br>
Version 0.4.0 introduced CleanerML,[5] a
standards-based markup language for writing new
cleaners. </div>
<div>On May 29, 2009, BleachBit version 0.5.0 added
support for Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows
7.[6] </div>
<div>On September 16, 2009, version 0.6.4 introduced
command-line interface support.[7]<br>
<br>
BleachBit is available for download through its
website and the repositories of many Linux
distributions.</div>
<div>
<table style="font-size: 12.32px; border: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); border-spacing: 3px; background-color: rgb(248, 249, 250); margin: 0.5em 0px 0.5em 1em; padding: 0.2em; clear: right; line-height: 1.5em; width: 22em; font-family: sans-serif;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="vertical-align:top"><span><a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.bleachbit.org/" style="color:rgb(51,102,204);text-decoration-line:none;background:url("")
100% 50%/0.857em
no-repeat;padding-right:1em" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"><br>
www.bleachbit.org</a></span></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<br>
Features<br>
</div>
<blockquote style="margin:0px 0px 0px
40px;border:none;padding:0px">
<div>Identifying and removing Web cache, HTTP cookies,
URL history, temporary files log files and Flash
cookies for Firefox, Opera, Safari, APT, Google
Chrome</div>
<div>Removing unused localizations (also called locale
files) which are translations of software</div>
<div>Shredding files and wiping unallocated disk space
to minimize data remanence</div>
<div>Wiping unallocated disk space to improve data
compression ratio for disk image backups</div>
<div>Vacuuming Firefox's SQLite database which suffers
fragmentation</div>
<div>Command line interface for scripting automation
and headless operation</div>
</blockquote>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>
<table style="font-size: 12.32px; border: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); border-spacing: 3px; background-color: rgb(248, 249, 250); margin: 0.5em 0px 0.5em 1em; padding: 0.2em; clear: right; line-height: 1.5em; width: 22em; font-family: sans-serif;">
<tbody>
<tr>
<th scope="row" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:left;white-space:nowrap">Written
in</th>
<td style="vertical-align:top"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Python_(programming_language)" title="Python (programming language)" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Python</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:left;white-space:nowrap"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system" title="Operating
system" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Operating
system</a></th>
<td style="vertical-align:top"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Windows" title="Microsoft Windows" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Microsoft
Windows</a><br>
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacOS" title="MacOS" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">macOS</a><br>
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux" title="Linux" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Linux</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:left;white-space:nowrap"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_size" title="File size" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Size</a></th>
<td style="vertical-align:top">11.5-12.2 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megabyte" title="Megabyte" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">MB</a> (Windows)</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:left;white-space:nowrap">Available
in</th>
<td style="vertical-align:top">64 languages<sup id="m_3767864098514526084m_-4231384344192402697gmail-cite_ref-2" style="line-height:1;unicode-bidi:isolate;white-space:nowrap;font-size:9.856px"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BleachBit#cite_note-2" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">[2]</a></sup></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:left;white-space:nowrap"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_categories#Categorization_approaches" title="Software categories" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Type</a></th>
<td style="vertical-align:top"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disk_cleaner" title="Disk cleaner" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">Disk
cleaner</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:left;white-space:nowrap"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_license" title="Software
license" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">License</a></th>
<td style="vertical-align:top"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License" title="GNU General Public License" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:none" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">GNU
General Public License</a></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<th scope="row" style="vertical-align:top;text-align:left;white-space:nowrap">Website</th>
<td style="vertical-align:top"><span><a rel="nofollow" href="https://www.bleachbit.org/" style="text-decoration-line:none;color:rgb(51,102,204);background:url("")
100% 50%/0.857em
no-repeat;padding-right:1em" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">www.bleachbit.org</a></span></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>Ted</div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
</div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Mon, Feb 20, 2023
at 12:30 PM Edward Lipman <<a href="mailto:edward.lipman@gmail.com" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">edward.lipman@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px
0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div dir="ltr">For $39 I'd use my own hammer!<br>
</div>
<br>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Mon, Feb 20,
2023 at 9:51 AM <<a href="mailto:jjrudy1@comcast.net" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">jjrudy1@comcast.net</a>>
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px
0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div>
<div lang="EN-US">
<div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">FYI</span></p><div><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">A
friend has two OLD laptops. One with
Windows XP, the other Windows 7. I
called both Staples and Best Buy both of
which will take them (and a lot of other
stuff) at no cost. However it does not
include wiping the disk. Staples offers
that service @$29 each, and Best Buy @39
each. Neither could explain to me what
a full erase means (for all I know they
may open the case and use a hammer).</span></p><div><span style="font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">John
Rudy</span></p><div><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif"> </span><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">781-861-0402</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">781-718-8334
cell</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">13
Hawthorne Lane</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif">Bedford
MA</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif"><a href="mailto:jjrudy1@comcast.net" target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">jjrudy1@comcast.net</a></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span id="cid:part1.6lmRsAoL.uDkL5Cx0@comcast.net"><image001.png></span><span style="font-size:10pt;font-family:Arial,sans-serif"></span></p><div> <br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></div>
</div>
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