wipe old dell laptop hard drive

llaadd · 18 Apr 2008 at 15:35

hi, i have a old hard drive taken from a MAC laptop (i think it's SATA if i remember) it was replaced by dell with a higher capacity but they left the old one.

I want to know if it's possible for me to wipe it and re-sell but i cannot access it! I was told it might be locked to only work in that laptop, is this right?

thanks.

update: MAC laptop HDD not Dell

bledd · 18 Apr 2008 at 15:53

they're not 'locked' it's just a laptop sized drive that's all

buy an external hard drive caddy for laptops (make sure you know what type it is, sata or ide)

if it is sata (google images it)
then this is perfect

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-026-BT&groupid=701&catid=14&subcat=72

i'd get one of them, and keep it as an external/backup drive, worth more than selling it

rpstewart · 18 Apr 2008 at 15:55

If the laptop had a hard disk password applied then (if it's anything like IBM/Lenovo) the drive is useless unless the password can be removed. You'll need to put the drive back into the laptop to do that.

bledd · 18 Apr 2008 at 16:01

didn't know you could do that, i assumed any other machine could format a hard drive

llaadd · 18 Apr 2008 at 16:04

rpstewart said:
If the laptop had a hard disk password applied then (if it's anything like IBM/Lenovo) the drive is useless unless the password can be removed. You'll need to put the drive back into the laptop to do that.

I think this is the case, I'll have to wait for my friend to get back from uni to do this, but once i put the hard drive back, how do i find the password and how do i remove?

Thanks

bledd · 18 Apr 2008 at 16:06

i've got to add, i've worked on a lot of dell laptops and never had one with a password on

rpstewart · 18 Apr 2008 at 16:11

llaadd said:
I think this is the case, I'll have to wait for my friend to get back from uni to do this, but once i put the hard drive back, how do i find the password and how do i remove?

Thanks

If you don't know the password then you're stuffed (again I'm assuming that the Dell passwording scheme is similar to IBM's), the disks for the bin. If you do know the password then you need to change it to a blank one in the BIOS.

llaadd · 18 Apr 2008 at 16:14

rpstewart said:
If you don't know the password then you're stuffed (again I'm assuming that the Dell passwording scheme is similar to IBM's), the disks for the bin. If you do know the password then you need to change it to a blank one in the BIOS.

meh, i'm an idiot some times, just got dell in my head for some reason!!!

I think it's from a MAC not a Dell and it is SATA!!

Sorry!!!

p.s. i have updated the original post.