[Shipw22]

I have a drive I'm going to give to a friend since I got a new one and he wants to expand his storage, but mine has sensitive stuff on it (school docs, passwords, and so on). I already backed it up, but I don't know of any free drive wiping software. I know for a fact you can still recover bits and pieces of data, even with the Windows tool, as I've tried it. If I remember right, zero-filling the drive is the most secure way. So what is a free program that can do this?

 

[XAslanX]

Hirens boot CD has several tools for zero filling drives. Depending on what brand drive you are going to zero fill there are programs on it specifically designed to zero fill the brand drive you have. http://www.afterdawn.com/software/system_tools/operating_systems/hirens_bootcd.cfm

 

[Angrybutcher]

DBAN (I think it's on Hiren's disk too)

http://www.dban.org/

 

[Shipw22]

I have a really small data limit, and 500MB would take up about 1/4 of my allowed monthly usage. Any programs that run on Windows maybe? I have an adapter so I can plug the drive in and run it off a USB port which is how I'm gonna have to do it, since I'm parting out the PC too because I'm building another one. If you cant think of an actual program, I guess I'll go along with that.

 

[XAslanX]

Eraser will work in a pinch http://eraser.heidi.ie/

 

[Shipw22]

Alright, I'll give that one a shot. I'll try to remember to post my results here later.

 

[Angrybutcher]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tmcclelland455

I have a really small data limit, and 500MB would take up about 1/4 of my allowed monthly usage. Any programs that run on Windows maybe? I have an adapter so I can plug the drive in and run it off a USB port which is how I'm gonna have to do it, since I'm parting out the PC too because I'm building another one. If you cant think of an actual program, I guess I'll go along with that.

DBAN is only 10mb for the iso.

 

[aHumanBeing]

CCleaner has a drive wipe feature that works great.

 

[DuckieHo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tmcclelland455

I have a really small data limit, and 500MB would take up about 1/4 of my allowed monthly usage. Any programs that run on Windows maybe? I have an adapter so I can plug the drive in and run it off a USB port which is how I'm gonna have to do it, since I'm parting out the PC too because I'm building another one. If you cant think of an actual program, I guess I'll go along with that.

Windows itself has a format mode to do a zero write.

1) Map the drive on an existing Windows OS.
2) Open command prompt.
3) Run format [Drive letter] /fs:NTFS /p:2

http://pcsupport.about.com/od/toolsofthetrade/ht/write-zeros-format-command.htm