Destroying hard drive - without opening it

[Lysander]

I need to get rid of my old hard drive and the data on it as well. However, I don't have one of those special screwdriver thingies which has 'six points' on it which seems necessary to open it so I could mess with the platters and get rid of the data.

So what's the best way to destroy as much of the data as possible without opening the drive? Low-level format? Unconditional format? Immersing the drive in water?

 

[Lysander]

water and fire wont do it, I remember PC Format did a test a couple of years back on this. Even after socked in petrol for hours and being set on fire the data could be recovered. It really depends how badly you need to rid the drive of the data. Enough that a casual person cant get it? Or enough that a data recovery specialist company cant get it?

Enough that no-one at all can get to it! I was thinking of doing an unconditional format [or two] but I don't know if that will be enough.

 

[Lysander]

Stop winding me up Looks like the best way would be to do an unconditional format, short of turning the drive into powder.