Computer help?

[Joe Schwab]

I just resurrected my old Toshiba Laptop. I was going to toss it because it just up and quit one day. Looked at it yesterday and turned it on and surprise !! it still works.

I'd like to donate it but there are documents on it that I cannot seem to remove. It has Windows 95. When you press Start and scroll up the list to Documents, it opens a list of my documents. How do I erase or delete these? I have tried everything from going to files to using select all / delete nothing works. any suggestions?

[reeldick]

Even after being deleted the files are there and someone with a little computer savy could read them.
Best bet is to remove the entire hard disk. I've even heard recommendations of smashing the hard drive with a hammer to make sure files can never be pulled from it.
Whoever you donate it to can install a new hard drive.

[snowball]

capn, if im not mistaken, that is a list only. You could verify if these files really do exist by doing a search for the file name.
TO delete the list, i believe on win 95, goto
start-settings-taskbar/start menu, on 1 tab or the other is a selection to delete documents list. It's been a long time since i've seen win95

[STGRule]

Actually I think that just reformatting the disk isn't enough. The way I understand it (and I might very well be wrong) is formatting the disk removes the "header" for the file that saves that space. Reformatting removes it so the space can be written over again. The original data is still there until something new is written over it. It can still be recovered. I think there are programs you can buy to "scramble" the data on the hard drive but your best bet is to just remove the hard drive and break it. New hard drives are cheap.

[ampersat]

Even if you think you've destroyed the drive with a hammer, there are businesses out there who can go to extreme measures to recover the data. Not that you should have to worry about such a thing but it is possible to do.

That being said, fdisk and format would work for 99% of the folks out there who are donating an old PC. Military, banking institutions, those involved in organized crime and the like will have to worry about going to extreme measures to fully erase old hard drives.

[lost_sailor]

Note that you can't delete the partition or format the disk that the active system is on - you'll have to boot up from a floppy disk (DOS!) or a CD.

If you have to worry about what someone might recover from a reformatted drive (a huge effort) ... your life is more interesting than mine.

[BigFishFever]

Best bet if you are going to donate the PC, I would suggest formatting the hard drive..and once that is completed run fdisk and delete the partitions.

I think I have a old 95 boot disk at home I can see if I can find that I could probably send to ya.

Lemme know!

[Joe Schwab]

No it's just some personal stuff, letters and flyers that I made up over the time I had it. I'll just delete it and let it go at that, Thanks.

[Rakkasan]

Bigfishfever has it. Reformat and you are good to go.

[Conspiracy Theory]

If you format it do an unconditional format. Don't choose the quick format. A quick format only erases the FAT(File Allocation Table) and leaves the actual data on the drive. The unconditional should erase the actual files (data).

If booting off a floppy you may need to type "format /?". That should get you help for the format command and tell you what extra parameters are needed to do an unconditional format.

Good luck.

[DB_Cooper]

You should have a folder under c:\windows called "recent". Delete these files.