Re: Clear HDD of old OS, etc?
On Tue, Jun 04, 2002 at 11:36:48AM +0200, Groen, N. (fd&s) wrote:
>
> > I wouldn't use /dev/random for that. It blocks when it runs out of
> > entropy which is very soon in that case. It could take some days to get
> > enough data from there. If you insist on pseudo-random data, try
> > /dev/urandom. It might not guarantee as much randomness but at least it
> > doesn't block.
> > BTW: yes|dd of=/dev/hdX
> >
> Hmm, why not ' if=/dev/zero' ?
> That device is made especially for such occasions.
What I have found that works very well is:
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hdX bs=512 count=100
This blows away the partition table and MBR so that fdisk actually warns
about using a 'zero' partition table. I am told that this is like the
factory new condition of many drives. My goal was a quick way to blow
away old NT/2000 configs and not have any remnant of prior boot
loaders to cause interference with new setups. My little woody pocket
cd works great for this.
I am sure that the urandom solution (over the entire disk?) is much
better if getting rid of the actual data is important, but having
read the bit that was posted here about microscopic data recovery,
that may not be worth the effort.
aloha (using debian in the workplace),
dave
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