Clean up computer being sold

[B.W.]

A friend of mine is selling his computer and wishes to remove all his
information from it. He does not have very much there. I realise that
probably reformat the hard drive is the best but I don't feel capable of
doing that for him, having tried that once before in the past.

What are the areas I need to delete information from?

I presume, My Documents and My Photos. But in IE and OE there appears to be
a lot of areas I might need to look at. I am creating a list of places but
possibly have not though of some places that may need cleaning up.

Thanks in advance for any help

B.W.

 

[Jupiter Jones [MVP]]

As a minimum perform a Clean Installation:
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/cleanxp.htm
Be sure to delete the partitions.

 

[B.W.]

Thank you for that information I don't wish however to reinstall the OS
just remove any personal information on the computer.

TIA

B.W.

 

[Santa]

Thank you for that information I don't wish however to reinstall the OS
just remove any personal information on the computer.

ONLY your Friend know WHERE he or SHE saved those personal Files on
THAT computer .. Mail, address book Bank Statements, Tax records We
donnot know What Your Friend used that computer for!!


We donnot know His or Her Habits..

 

[Jupiter Jones [MVP]]

Then simply delete all profiles AFTER creating new profiles.

However your friend is the only one who may know exactly and to what extent
personal data is created and saved, but most do not remember the details.

A Clean Installation is the only way if privacy of data is to be assured.

 

[larryo]

-----Original Message-----
Thank you for that information I don't wish however to reinstall the OS
just remove any personal information on the computer.

TIA

B.W.






.
What M.Jones is saying is that the safest way to assure

that all personal information is removed is to do a
completely new enstallation of the operating system.
Even this does not assure complete erasure of all
personal information, as a forensic study of the hard
drive could still turn up something, but that is an
unlikely event. To be safe boot the computer from the
original installation disk and do a clean installation of
the operating system. Just follow the prompts on the
screen. It isn't hard to do.

luck
larryo

 

[Bruce Chambers]

A friend of mine is selling his computer and wishes to remove all his
information from it. He does not have very much there. I realise that
probably reformat the hard drive is the best but I don't feel capable of
doing that for him, having tried that once before in the past.

What are the areas I need to delete information from?

I presume, My Documents and My Photos. But in IE and OE there appears to be
a lot of areas I might need to look at. I am creating a list of places but
possibly have not though of some places that may need cleaning up.

Thanks in advance for any help

B.W.

To protect your friend's personal information and data from any
future users of average skills, you should, at the very least, format
the hard drive and reinstall only the OS and those applications whose
licenses are to be included in the transfer. If you wish to do a more
thorough job of protecting your friend's personal data, WipeDrive 2.2.1
(http://www.accessdata.com/Product07_Overview.htm?ProductNum=07) meets
U.S. DoD standards for securely cleaning surplus unclassified hard
drives, and could be used before formatting and reinstalling the OS and
applications.


--

Bruce Chambers

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