wiping hard drive ?s

[msuper73]

Im giving a computer to my brother and I want to make sure none of my personal info remains. Im not worried about my brother having access to any of my info but there will be other people who might have access to it. I just have some questions about cleaning the hard drive before giving it away. If I use a program like Hard Disk Scrub to wipe the hard drive, does that mean Ill have to reinstall the operating system and other necessary programs?? Am I going to screw up the entire system possibly? Is there another option I should take than wiping the hard drive such as reformatting? Any help/ suggestions would be much appreciated. Thanks.

[CBMatt]

If you wipe the hard drive clean (or format it), you will have to reinstall the OS, all programs, and...well, everything.  Did your computer come with any Windows (assuming this is what you use) CD's?  You might want to check out the following...

http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000186.htm

[msuper73]

thanks for your reply. the cds that came with my comp are:

-OS reinstallation cd XP Home Ed.
-Drivers & Utilities for device drivers, diagnostics, utilities, and online doc.
-Drivers & Utilities For reinstalling fax modem for windows
-Applications Backup for Dell-installed programs
-Application for reinstalling Roxio cd creator
-Monitor reinstallation
-Microsoft works reinstallation
 
Does this sound sufficient to get my system back usable after wiping? Also, is there a recommended wiping program? Any other suggestions? thanks

[WillyW]

...

 Also, is there a recommended wiping program? Any other suggestions?

Check out: 

How to help make sure all data is erased on hard drive
http://www.computerhope.com/issues/ch000520.htm

particularly:
http://dban.sourceforge.net/


You might like to read:
http://software.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/09/14/178204&from=rss
and
http://www.digitalissues.co.uk/html/os/misc/shred.html
regarding DBAN.

DBAN cost -  free.   


I hope this helps.

[CBMatt]

thanks for your reply. the cds that came with my comp are:

-OS reinstallation cd XP Home Ed.
-Drivers & Utilities for device drivers, diagnostics, utilities, and online doc.
-Drivers & Utilities For reinstalling fax modem for windows
-Applications Backup for Dell-installed programs
-Application for reinstalling Roxio cd creator
-Monitor reinstallation
-Microsoft works reinstallation
 
Does this sound sufficient to get my system back usable after wiping? Also, is there a recommended wiping program? Any other suggestions? thanks

Those should be just fine.  All of the aforementioned links will help you with wiping out the hard drive.  Then just use the XP Home CD to reinstall Windows (boot with it already inserted into the computer), and the other CD's to reinstall your drivers and Microsoft Works.

[patio]

Keep your drive and throw a new one in there and re-install XP...

I never let my HDD's go anywhere.