Wiping storage

kakarott · 9 Jan 2023 at 13:54

So I'm gonna use my laptop fulltime and pack away / or give to a family member. How do you wipe the storage so it can be used by someone else?

Mr Mcgoo · 9 Jan 2023 at 20:16

what drive do you have? 3.5"/2.5" hdd or 2.5" ssd or m.2 ssd or m.2 nvme?

kakarott · 9 Jan 2023 at 20:56

Mr Mcgoo said:
what drive do you have? 3.5"/2.5" hdd or 2.5" ssd or m.2 ssd or m.2 nvme?

2.5" HDD and SSD

Mr Mcgoo · 9 Jan 2023 at 21:26

kakarott said:
2.5" HDD and SSD

do you have another desktop pc in which you can plug the drives into?

Blueball · 9 Jan 2023 at 21:35

You can wipe the drive in-situ:

Troubleshooting tips - Which? Computing - Which?

computing.which.co.uk

Using the "built in" erase options in Win 8-11 is not as secure as a full overwrite. It all depends on how secure you want to be.

darael · 9 Jan 2023 at 23:18

It sounds as though you just want to quickly wipe the drives so you can reinstall Windows and pass the machine on so the family member can use the machine. In which case, just run Windows installer from a USB stick, erase all partitions from all drives when asked for the installation location, then install Windows.

Are they going to use both a hard drive and SSD? I'd be half tempted to take the hard drive out if the SSD on it's own has enough storage for their needs.

kakarott · 10 Jan 2023 at 01:14

I have caddy I can plug it into. Yes both to be reused.

Mr Mcgoo · 10 Jan 2023 at 12:20

darael said:
It sounds as though you just want to quickly wipe the drives so you can reinstall Windows and pass the machine on so the family member can use the machine. In which case, just run Windows installer from a USB stick, erase all partitions from all drives when asked for the installation location, then install Windows.

Are they going to use both a hard drive and SSD? I'd be half tempted to take the hard drive out if the SSD on it's own has enough storage for their needs.

This is the quickest option. Windows media creation tool would be best. As long as you have a spare 8gb usb stick it can be used to install a windows boot to install windows from. The delete partitions

kakarott · 10 Jan 2023 at 14:27

And best way to wipe it in case someone tried to snoop around by recovering files?

Armageus · 10 Jan 2023 at 14:32

kakarott said:
And best way to wipe it in case someone tried to snoop around by recovering files?

For SSDs you should use the Secure Erase function within the manufacturers own SSD Toolbox software (although in most cases you will need the drive to be connected directly via SATA/M2 rather than in a USB enclosure)

13oots2 · 10 Jan 2023 at 16:57

Ccleaner has a drive wipe built in, make sure when you install you don't select the junk programmes it wants to install.

Mcnumpty2323 · 10 Jan 2023 at 17:35

Your bios may have secure erase in it
All depends on the motherboard
Otherwise I recommend parted magic
If you look around enough you can still find the free version
It definitely issues sata secure erase command
Not just do an overwrite
And actually works on m2 drives too
Some of the other stuff I tried especially on m2 drives
They didn't actually make data unrecoverable

Or could just use cmd and diskpart
Select correct disk
Clean
Or clean all
Clean all may do some overwrites which yeah not really great for ssd
But doing it once on a drive your giving away
Shouldn't be any great issues
Can use diskpart from in windows
Or from windows set up