How can I destroy an old harddrive?
 

Im getting a new computer so I want to throw away my old computer(It shuts down a lot so its not worth donating or selling).

I reformatted the harddrive and I took it out.

What else can I do? Like if I leave it in a sink full of water will that destroy it?

Weld the drive's platters with an arc welder.

use Muriatic acid or a magnet... or the best way to do it, smash it with a hammer. :)

take it apart, drill couple holes in the platters, and throw each platter away in a different dumpster.

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

soak it in a bucket of water

salt water... :2 cents:

You say the computer shuts down all the time, but it's still not worth trashing. You'd be surprised how old and crappy a computer is but how useful it still is to people.
On the hard drive though, un-screw everything and destroy anything you can.

I don't imagine water will do much.

If you want it gone, not able to recover any data, you need to physically destroy the drive.

Big companies have expensive hard drive shredders that will shred the drive. For someone at home your best bet is to take the drive apart, and drill holes in the platters. A sander or grinder or something that will fuck up the platter surface would be nice to use in addition to the holes.

Derik's Boot and nuke it.
Then use Evidence Eliminator's DOD wipe.
Then soak it in acid.
Then hit it with a sledge hammer.
Then burn it.
Then put it in a rocket and launch it into space towards the sun.

That outta do it!!!!!

bend-tech blender /thread

Copy whatever method the U.S. Army uses to retire hard drives

Umm microwave?? Lol xx

Doesn't magnets kill hard drives??

Either take out the platters and burn them, or use a very high powered magnet

They physically destroy the drive.

I would post a link but it's on a .mil, not sure if that's a good idea.

Google: destroy hard disk site:.mil

have an electrician run it through a high powered degausser

belt sander + platters = :pimp

or dd if=/dev/sda of=/dev/null (several times, and also dd'ing random bits)

Run this a few times

http://www.dban.org/

Then destroy the platters

http://www.popularmechanics.com/tech...o/4212242.html

If your not going to go the extra mile to be paranoid why bother?

But you could just be a slacker and whack the shit out of it with a hammer that will deter your casual dumpster diver from retrieving any info that remains. ( And there is still info there trust me a regular format leaves alot behind )

Open the drive, take grinder machine , work it on all the disks.

Nice! My first thought was a sledgehammer.

FYI, a format doesn't clear the drive, only the indexing that tells the OS where to find files and directories.

It's like throwing out the library catalog, but the books are still on the shelves.

Here's a util that invokes your drives internal secure erase facility:

http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/SecureErase.shtml

I love the enthusiasm when it comes to suggestions on how to break things :)

Ultimately we're all kids who love to smash shit.. its funny.

http://www.instructables.com/files/d...0RN.MEDIUM.jpg

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/24/18...7d4ba3b7_m.jpg

Actually, take out the platters, and hit them with a magnet, then make a nice wind-chime out of them, they sound great :)

Hmmm that reminds me I have a drive I'm halfway through disassembling... I stopped because I wanted to take pics of the process... need to get back to it! :D

1 cooler filled with ice and beer
1 stack of wood
1 harddrive on top of stack
invite friends, light pile of wood and consume beer whilelistening to your favorite tunes

Then why does reformatting free up so much space?

Because you are thinking about it incorrectly. Formatting throws out the file INDEX. Not the FILES. Without the index, you have no means of knowing WTF is there or where to start. So it's all "free space" to be written over.

1 Ten Penny nail and a good sized hammer is all you need just drive the nail through the platters in two places and you're good to go.http://www.cvhspreps.com/forums/inde...%3Btype=avatar

Ok, let me retry the library analogy another way... formatting irretrievably whites out the title page and spine of the library books. You can't easily see what's in the collection as a whole, but you can still pick up random books and read the text inside them.

Same with a computer format. The actual content data is not overwritten, just the indexing that points to it.

To write out a new (empty) index will take seconds. To wipe every sector on (say) a 500GB hard drive will take a couple of hours, minimum.

That wouldn't stop a specialist lab from recovering 90%+ of the data on the drive... however, if you're that paranoid and/or have something to hide from a company or agency that would be capable of funding that, you've probably got more serious problems. :pimp

Who here has had a drive fail? Did you wipe it before you RMA'd it?......

Big hammer to it. Put it in a garbage bag. Add some old fridge meet, and shit in the bag and seal it up. Throw in dumpster. You'll be safe lol

I'd just keep it around.

But I'd drill it a few times if I was to throw it. That should do it. Who's gonna mess with a drilled HD.

most methods here can be foiled by forensic methods (not a perfect recovery, just 'some' data) - as long as there is magnetic surface left, things can be read - no matter how fragmented it may be

1) take drive platter(s) out
2) use a grinder/sander to take the entire(!) disk surface off (both sides)

no recovery method known to man will recover data

little effort
little expense (no rockets required :thumbsup :1orglaugh )
perfect obliteration

Paranoia will destroya

Just throw it under some shit in a messy part your house. Years from now it'll still be there and nobody will care any more than they do now.

Its simple and easy procedure:

1 ) Buy a big can
2 ) Put the drive inside
3 ) Buy 50 kg of enriched uranium or plutonium
4 ) Put it all into the can with the drive
5 ) Fire several neutrons on the can
6 ) Watch for the nuclear explosion burns your drive. If it doesn't vaporize it entirely, don't worry, there will be no one alive near it to take your data.

That's overkiill :P

throw it from the 50th floor building

LOL... I think format is enough though you can still try this stuff:

http://www.jcsd.k12.ms.us/jctc/mig-welding.JPG

I understand they're good at erasing things.

They've been practicing with the Apollo 11 moon mission tapes. :1orglaugh

Some of you guys are just paranoid !

Last time I looked into it (which was admittedly a few years ago, things may have changed) a "full" format does not clear sectors, it just verifies that it can READ each one.

So a quick or full format is not going to get rid of your data at all.

If there is nothing illegal on the hard drive, I would worry about it. To much energy spent on an old drive.

put it in the microwave!

what you have to hide so bad you need it destroyed is my question?