On Sun, Jan 23, 2011 at 11:39 AM, Tom Chambers <[email protected]> wrote:

> List members ;
>                    A friend wants to dispose of two old MACs , but is
> worried about information which may still
> be on the hard drives . Is there a way to wipe or overwrite the drives
> before dumping the machines ?
  Why not just remove the drives?  The older Macs, OS 9 machines, were
quite easy to get into.  It would take less time to take those drives
out than to zero them out.

  Steve

Tom

I just did that. Removed drives from two old PowerMacs and put a hammer to them after leaving them outside in the 12 degree cold overnight. Didn't bother to open the case. The way it rattles, there's a few pieces inside. Now I can take them to the local recycle center as soon as it warms up to freezing.

A disk recovery company can still retrieve data from a broken disk [very difficult and time consuming], but is it likely they'd want your friend's data? Probably not unless they're gummint computers.

BTW:
    *Mac* = Apple Macintosh computer

    *MAC* = Media Access Control, the lower sublayer of the OSI
            data link layer, the interface between a node's Logical
            Link Control and the network's physical layer. The MAC
            differs for various physical media. [acronym]

Get out your ball peen hammer and whack away at the disk! A maul might work better, but ball peen hammer is more fun.

Betty


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