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Deleting stuff on external drive
I have several external drives that I want to give to a friend. When info is "deleted," does it still remain on the drive like a hard drive, or is the drive really wiped clean? ec
I have several external drives that I want to give to a friend. When info is "deleted," does it still remain on the drive like a hard drive, or is the drive really wiped clean? ec
Yes the data remains until it is overwritten. The data is simply marked as available to be overwritten.
To Clean the drive have a look at this:
Disk - Clean and Clean All with Diskpart Command
The cipher command also allows you to securely erase a drive: How to securely overwrite deleted files with a built-in Windows tool
As mjf has posted; I have used and recommend this.
Disk - Clean and Clean All with Diskpart Command
I have never used this.
How to securely overwrite deleted files with a built-in Windows tool
But we do have a tutorial by Golden which might be helpful.
Cipher Command - Overwrite Deleted Data in Windows
DBAN, Dave[?] Boot and Nuke is another way to sure-fire delete an entire hard-drive; just make sure it is aimed at the correct hard-drive, external boot devices can and sometimes do shuffle the drive letters.