Disposing of an old PC?

[DonnyNoel]

Anyone on here got any tips for the best way to go about this? My mum wants to get rid of her old Windows98 abacus and whilst there was hardly ever anything on it of note regarding personal information (it may never even have been connected to the internet either) she's wanting to make sure its permanently erased before it goes to the tip.

It doesn't have to be technical - just let me know how big the hammer needs to be and where to point it.

Ta muchly.

[jucyberry]

Just get a nice screwdriver and dismantle it a bit at a time, like mecchano in reverse.. it's facinating.. (I'm so sad) lol

then if you are using a hammer just smash the hard drive I guess.. Not in the least technical, but very enjoyable...

[nightporter]

Smashing a hard drives not as easy as you might think and they're hard to get inside too. You can get software off the net that will wipe it so that even the FBI couldn't get read it. Or you could just take a big hammer to the connections.

[DonnyNoel]

OK (stop). Hammer time!

[Snods Shinpad 2]

Put the harddrive in a bucket of bleach, then whack it in the microwave.

Should do the job.

[BobG]

Now that is one killer app that Snod! Like it....

BobG

[Viking Don]

In my experience you simply have to copy something really important to it that you don't have any other copy of, then just delete the original. Hey presto, the drive is truly f**ked.

That and very large magnets. Don't ask why I collect very large magnets.

[German Rover]

Had to dispose of a big stack of hard drives at work a couple of years ago found sledgehammers and Fijians combined did the job for me :-D

[bobjimwilly]

In my experience you simply have to copy something really important to it that you don't have any other copy of, then just delete the original. Hey presto, the drive is truly f**ked.

Brilliant, and very true

[RobTheRover]

A screwdriver hammered through the disk works a treat.