Free program for securely erasing HDD's

[Bgunner]

I just recently purchased 2 Samsung 980 pro 2TB M.2 NVMe drives for my PC as I am planning on changing cases soon and many new cases don't have the amount of 3.5 inch drive bays that I would require to keep my storage needs fed. I am planning on shipping a HDD or two to my son to alleviate his storage problems but I want to securely erase the HDD's first.

I'm looking for a program that is free that does 7 or more sweeps (standard military protocol) over the drive to wipe any info to the point of no recovery.

What programs do you guys know about that would suit my needs?

 

[Josh B]

Go to scrap metal forum under computers and look for hard drives
A lot of those guys are wiping drives day and night for resale and have a ton of options you could pick up just by reading a bit

 

[sgtsandman]

Bleach Bit

 

[Blmpkn]

 

[2011Supercab]

I just use the one built into windows

Press Windows+X to open the Power Users menu, and then click “Command Prompt” or “Command Prompt (Admin).”
and type
format j: /fs:NTFS /p:1

In my example J is the drive letter and 1 is the number of passes/times it will write zeros to the hard drive,

Notice the space between format j and : / and S /

It's not the fastest way and can take several hours depending on how big the hard drive is.

When it's done type the word exit and hit enter.

EDIT - DO NOT TYPE THE LETTER FOR YOUR OPERATING SYSTEM DRIVE, usually C

 

[SenorNoob]

I know it's not what you ask but the only way to be truly secure is to destroy the platters. Hammer, shredder, or torch.

As for what you did ask, Active@ KillDisk Freeware.

 

[dvdswan]

BFH and Axe do a fine job for emergency destruction. Added benefit, it allows you to release aggression without involving someone else... unless they really need it.

 

[97RangerXLT]

I just use the one built into windows

Press Windows+X to open the Power Users menu, and then click “Command Prompt” or “Command Prompt (Admin).”
and type
format j: /fs:NTFS /p:1

In my example J is the drive letter and 1 is the number of passes/times it will write zeros to the hard drive,

Notice the space between format j and : / and S /

It's not the fastest way and can take several hours depending on how big the hard drive is.

When it's done type the word exit and hit enter.

EDIT - DO NOT TYPE THE LETTER FOR YOUR OPERATING SYSTEM DRIVE, usually C

If you are doing this on a limited basis, I think this is the best way to securely wipe a drive. Malwarebytes also has a GUI drive wiper if you have that installed., but really the windows method via command prompt works great. I would run the command prompt as admin.

Tell your son to do the same to his drives if he is getting rid of them. alternately if the drives are of no use to him, physically destroying the platters and heads is the best way to do this. then harvest the magnets out of them for some fun.

AJ

 

[JoshT]

I was going to say check out Major Geeks, but these look like good suggestions. Command line recommended would probably be the best way, but I hate recommending that because it's too easy for someone inexperienced to messup in an extreme way. Wrong move there and everything is gone. On the rare occasion that I need to do something like this I'll usually go to Major Geeks and see what names I recognize that'll do the job. Malwarebytes definitely sounds like one I've used in the past.

Honestly I'm rarely ever reusing a hard drive. The time I have reused it was either in another computer I was building for myself, or putting it into a housing to use as a portable. If I'm building or replacing for someone else, a new drive is part of the deal. If not reused as mentioned they are either dead and get destroyed or get stacked on a shelf to collect dust until the end of time. Might be time to dust a few off, recently I've had the desire to setup a home file server and I've probably got enough spare parts to do it.

 

[Bgunner]

The issue with just formatting is that it does not erase fully so that data is recoverable. This is the reason for wanting to securely erase the drive before I ship it to him. He will be just adding this drive to his system and keeping his other drives.

He is not paying for the drive so I really don't want to buy a program as I don't usually give away or sell my drives but his 3 drives are full and he needs storage and I won't be using these drives anyways.

I'll check out Malwarebytes but so far the one sgtsandman mentioned is topping the list for what I need. I'm still researching though.

 

[Josh B]

If you are doing this on a limited basis, I think this is the best way to securely wipe a drive. Malwarebytes also has a GUI drive wiper if you have that installed., but really the windows method via command prompt works great. I would run the command prompt as admin.

Tell your son to do the same to his drives if he is getting rid of them. alternately if the drives are of no use to him, physically destroying the platters and heads is the best way to do this. then harvest the magnets out of them for some fun.

AJ

That's true, 97, CCleaner has one also I believe.. One sad fact about "free" is they always take or get something back

 

[Josh B]

Most drive manufacturers also have programs on their website. I think CCleaner also has layered options and number of wipes, I've never used it for that tho, although I do use the cleaner occasionally

 

[ronclark]

ABAN is great, make a boot USB and any attached drives get nuked

 

[Bgunner]

ABAN is great, make a boot USB and any attached drives get nuked

I don't want to wipe all my drives and tearing my PC apart to erase a drive or two seems silly. I have 8 separate drives 4 HDD's and 4 SSD's that's a lot of wires and chance to screw up something.

Most drive manufacturers also have programs on their website. I think CCleaner also has layered options and number of wipes, I've never used it for that tho, although I do use the cleaner occasionally

I already have Ccleaner installed on my system as I used to use it a lot but not so much anymore. It's been so long since I used it that it popped up a message saying that it was over 20 revisions out of date. lol

I'll use Ccleaner to wipe the drive I'm sending him as it is already installed.

Many manufactures do have secure erase features but mainly for SSD's and not so much for HDD's. The drive I'll send him is from 2007 a Hitachi Deskstar 500GB. Its old but still good enough for him to install some games on to free up his SSD's space.

 

[Josh B]

I don't worry about the revisions for it, I just use it to empty the trash, usually before I've even connected to the internet, in fact I prefer the older version that is not so deep in what it's suppose to clean