If you ever hear the words “Wipe Hard Drive” then you should automatically assume that this refers to erasing all data present on the drive. If you delete everything it doesn’t necessarily mean that you are wiping your hard drive and even when you format your hard drive this also doesn’t always erase all data. To Wipe Hard Drive you will have to take some extra steps for erasing this data.

When you complete formatting of a hard drive or erase any of the partition then you are essentially deleting the files and nothing more which is like hiding the data which becomes no longer blatantly visible however it isn’t gone for good. Using a file recovery software can easily retrieve this information hence if you wish to ensure that all your data is wiped for good then you will have to Wipe Hard Drive using a recovery software.

How to Wipe Hard Drive on your PC?

Time Required: This can take some minutes or several hours according to the size of your hard drive and the kind of software you select to Wipe Hard Drive. Here is what you need to do to Wipe Hard Drive for good:

  1. Create a back up of everything that you wish to keep safe because once you Wipe Hard Drive then no method will be able to salvage anything back from your hard drive.

If you have been using any cloud service then you can be sure that all your crucial information has been backing up online continuously. However you should still remember to create a back of all data you’re your require because at times many drives are present on one hard drive. You will be able to access these drive volumes on the Windows Tool for Disk Management.

  1. Then complete the download and installation of data destruction software. Any of the free data destruction programs will be able to do the job of wiping the hard drive outside of the Windows Operating System which is an essential tool if you wish to Wipe Hard Drive which was installed on the Windows system.

Wiping any hard drive must be independent of the kind of operating system that you use hence you must use the tools that are bootable. This means that you will be able to use a single process for wiping hard drive whether you are using Linux, Windows XP, Windows 8, Windows 7 or any other kind of operating system.

  1. The next task is to finish all the essential steps that are required to complete the installation of your data destruction software. If it is bootable software such as DBAN, then you require the ISO image on a DVD, CD or any pen drive such as a USB flash.

If you opt for a CD or DVD, this will require you to burn an ISO image on to this disc and then boot the software from within this disc to be able to operate the software. However if you have a USB Flash Drive then you will have to burn the ISO image on to this Flash drive and then complete the booting process from this flash drive to go ahead.

  1. Then Wipe Hard Drive following the instructions that are shown by the software.
  2. When you are finished wiping the hard drive then you can stay free of any worry that your hard drive is now cleared for good in a way that the data cannot be retrieved.

You will now be able to complete the installation of the drive on Windows, make a fresh partition or simply sell the hard drive, throw it away or even recycle it or you can restore your files from your previously created backup.

By Cybil

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