On 10/08/2010 12:31 PM, Linuxguy123 wrote: > I bought a hard drive and wrote a bunch of information to it as an > external drive only to find that it won't fit in my laptop as an > internal drive. > > How do I absolutely destroy all the data on the drive so that I may > safely return it to the retailer for a refund ? > > Thanks > This was discussed at quiet some length in the thread Scrub free disk blocks See URL http://lists.fedoraproject.org/pipermail/users/2010-August/subject.html Scrub free disk blocks Even though the subject is titled for free disk blocks, the tools mentioned also apply to securely erasing the whole drive. The command line utility wipe could be used to wipe out the entire drive. Of course, if you are really worried about the personal and proprietary data on the drive, you could either destroy the drive altogether and forget about a replacement, or if you have access to a powerful electromagnet of a few million gauss, then subject the disk to that magnetic field moving it around the electromagnet several times :) :) Of course, I have never done it because I do not have such a magnet. -- users mailing list users@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe or change subscription options: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/users Guidelines: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Mailing_list_guidelines