I am selling my laptop and have already re-installed windows, is there anything else i need to do?

Question

I am worried about people being able to get my data off the laptop

Answer 1

Download the iso file 'Boot & Nuke' burn it to a CD or DVD then boot it up, it will wipe all the data from the harddrive behond recovery, then re-install the OS.

Answer 2

fomatting the hard disk and re-installing windows isnt enough as all the data is still sitting on the hard disk waiting till its written over, its quite easy to get hold of a program that will recover your personal data from the hard disk - those programs are intended for people who have accidentally deleted a file that they need so restores it but anyone can use the recovery program, you can get software that writes over all the blank space on your hard disk making it very hard for anyone to restore any info from your hard disk, sorry but I dont know what those programs are called and if any are free online

Answer 3

If you deleted all the partitions then your information is gone foreverrrr, you have nothing to worry about. If you didn't quite know what you were doing. Check over them =) x

Answer 4

there are free DOD wipes for data

it overwrites everything with 101010101010

3 times to hundreds of times

the overwriting destroys the data

I forgot where I got the DOD software, it was free

try google searching or asking cnet.com

look for sites like this:  http://www.thefreecountry.com/security/s...

dept of defense has standards for the laptops data

Answer 5

laptops-

http://ruggedlaptop.com/

Answer 6

Depending on the degree of paranoia involved, simply deleting files does not remove them...it only changes the filename.

If you have delicate or private data (passwords, bank accounts, credit cards, etc.) then the only certain method is OVERWRITING the entire disk.  This should be done at least 5X; a freeware application for this is 'Eraser' (get it at 'snapfiles.com/freeware')

That would mean re-installing windows, but trust me, that is less work than notifying every account you have about a possible security breech.

Answer 7

The best way to protect data is to go buy a hard disk drive and take the original one out, and put the new one in.