Windows 7 - Need HDDErase That will work with SATA ...

I have previously used Ultimate Boot CD with HDDErase to securely eliminate data from a SATA drive - that was on a Compaq minitower . no issues really other than having to hunt the utility after UBCD loaded some linux derivative.

but now i'm mystified. I have a HP DC7600 with a 250gb barracuda that was my daily driver Windows 7 ultimate with all my very sensitive data etc and I"m getting it ready to sell.
the hdd and the dvd drive are on SATA headers/controller.
when I run ubcd [the same cd i used before] it does not attempt to load whatever linux that was, instead I have a text screen with a few choices for loading something - one of the free DOS's? anyway when I finally get to the HDDErase [also called Secure Erase] util, it barfs because nothing has identified the SATA hdd. If instead I browse the menu for some other utilities to use, several of them work just fine, finding the 250gb drive and the dvd like child's play.

anyone know of maybe a more robust bootable image that does have the HDDErase util?

i've tried setting/resetting the various options in bios to no avail. those options are pretty limited on this system.

Try the clean all command prompt in this tutorial:.
SSD / HDD : Optimize for Windows Reinstallation

i'm on my way now. moved the drive to another system i have and booted the ubcd - this time the utility could get to the hard drive - different bios implementation. its now running. thanks
If you're unfamiliar with HDDErase [secure erase] and Enhanced version, its an interesting story. the 'feature' has been in most ata type drives from major mftrs, but went neglected by the system makers

http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/C...eProtocols.pdf

Glad to hear you solved the issue, albeit in a complicated way.

The easiest solution (for future reference) would have been to simply set the SATA controller to IDE mode in your BIOS, then boot the UBCD.

did so. didn't work.

If you've got linux running you can zero-fill a partition (or disk) with this:

(replace /dev/sda with correct value; /dev/zero is fixed).

One problem might be that a linux boot CD might not have a "/dev/zero"

You can also use /dev/random rather than /dev/zero, but it's a lot slower.

Ow. I see. That's surprising - I can only guess HDDErase uses some kind of unusual low-level access - I'm not sure, really.

For future reference, and other posters that might want to wipe their hard drives, all you need is clean and cleanall commands as theog mentioned. This is the definitive guide:

Secure Erase / Wipe : Definition and Methods

Regards,
Golden

I stick with DBAN (Darik's Boot and Nuke). http://www.dban.org/download It is a bootable CD that will overwrite the HDD with random data, if I remember correctly it uses a Mersenne twister algorithm to fill the hard drive, you can set the number of passes you want performed. Short of a sledge hammer, this is about as good as it gets. (In my own opinion anyway)

it is not clear to me that the Clean All command executes the hard drive's internal Secure Erase process. If so, which one, and why is it not specifically cited? Nowhere is the exact type of regimen referred to, no specification is cited, and the exact methodology is not described. I personally would not trust it for sensitive drives/data. A lot of people use the term "secure erase" in a generic fashion and are not referring to that which is described in detail in the article I linked.