Wiping harddrive

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So I gave in and bought an SSD to upgrade my laptop. 240GB but in disk manager it comes up as 116GB. Strike one. Download some cloning software, clone my 232GB drive over (took 3 hours?), swap drives. won't boot. Strike two? Whatever. It's clearly not a 240GB drive, and I did not know that until I opened the package (it says on it that it is a 240GB drive), so, I figured it cost me nothing to go through the process of cloning and swapping before I return the drive.

Except... wiping the drive. Forgot that I do have some passwords on that computer (in the browsers). Would hate for anyone to hack their way into my BITOG account...

I found a link that said "quick" format just wipes the (file listing? index listing? whatever sector holds the listing of what is on the drive) of the disk without actually deleting the bulk of the drive. But if I turn off quick format it does a "write zero" to the drive? So I'm doing that, and it looks like it will take a few hours to format.

My question is, is that pretty well good and done? There's nothing on there that I'm worried about, only passwords, and those should be easy enough to just reset the critical ones.
 
CCleaner has a wipe free space option. Give it a single-pass wipe and it will be fine.

If you are in the market for SSDs and you have some patience, wait around until the autumn. Samsung 860 EVO 1TB drives were selling for $110 and 1TB QVOs were $89 around the holidays. EVOs are currently around $170 and QVOs are $129 for perspective.
 
Yeah, I thought I'd splurge and get the 240, it was $10 more than the 128 that I knew I could run with. But $89, that's kinda pricey. I just found out today that I could use more memory, there's only 4GB in this machine and I didn't realize it was that low. So that $40 would be better spent there, IMO.

I've got a bunch of junk on this machine but it adds up to 50GB. To me, that is a huge amount, but I guess in the scheme of things today, not really. But it seems unlikely that I "need" to wait for 1TB drives to get any cheaper.

CCleaner, that looks like freeware. Once this non-quick format gets done I'll look into that.
 
CCleaner has a history of packing malware in with its main software. Generally the manufacturer of the SSD you purchased will have an app that will do what you're looking for.
 
The ATA / SATA specification includes a Secure Erase function may be built into the drive. Most drives do support it.

I'm confused, did they ship a 120 GB drive in a 240 package? What does it say on the drive?
 
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Originally Posted by mk378
The ATA / SATA specification includes a Secure Erase function may be built into the drive. Most drives do support it.


+1.
Hardest part of doing a Secure Erase is getting BIOS/EFI to do it.
Most mfgrs don't like to leave it exposed very far into the boot cycle, as virus writers would hit it if it were exposed.
 
Originally Posted by 55Test
CCleaner has a history of packing malware in with its main software. Generally the manufacturer of the SSD you purchased will have an app that will do what you're looking for.


No, CCleaner only gives an option for the user to download Google Chrome and is downloaded separate of the main CCleaner install. The CCleaner virus was made from Chinese hackers that was available via a download from a 3rd party website and only affected version 5.33.6 back in 2017. That was fixed immediately with v5.34.
 
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Where did you procure said 240GB drive? Was it a name brand reputable vendor or no-name reseller? How does your UEFI/BIOS report the drive? Check to make sure you are running latest BIOS.

Try running diskpart list disk to see if there is a size discrepancy:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/diskpart

For wiping HDDs, you need us a scrubber that writes random data. You'll need to boot from a USB or other drive than the one you are scrubbing. Something like DBAN will work.
 
I bought a Kingston off Amazon. Says 240GB on it but disk manager has it come up as 116GB.

Edit: I formated it twice in disk manager, and each time it stayed stubbornly at 116GB.
 
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Was it sold by Amazon or fulfilled by Amazon?

Try booting to BIOS, usually F2 on boot. It should report the actual size. Also use the Kingston SSD manager to ID and wipe before returning

Edit: BIOS should report the model # which you can x-ref on the vendor website.
 
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Sold on Amazon.

[Linked Image]

[Linked Image]
 
So I swapped drives and it does say 240GB... huh. What is wrong with disk manager then?

I did pop out the HD and went back into BIOS, and this time it says no harddrive, so it appears to be seeing the drive. Maybe I don't need to return the drive?

Edit: from what I can tell, I don't have any disks for this, not sure about making a recovery disk. I bought this computer used; I'm going to make a run to Home Depot and if I can remember to, I might get a 16GB jump drive as all I have are 8's and that does not appear big enough to make a recovery disk.
 
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Why don't you try really swapping it, and see if it becomes a 240GB when connected to your internal SATA port, as seen from BIOS?
Edit:
Might be an issue with whatever adapter you're currently using.
 
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Originally Posted by spackard
Why don't you try really swapping it, and see if it becomes a 240GB when connected to your internal SATA port, as seen from BIOS?
Might be an issue with whatever adapter you're currently using.

Adapter? Software adapter or cable? Cable is some Sabrent cable, but I don't see how a cable would limit how much of the drive it'd see.
 
This is likely a limitation on the other SATA port on your Lappy or it's not configured correctly in bios. Disk manager can only report what the UEFI / motherboard SATA driver reports.

What drive options are in your bios?
 
I wouldn't worry about cloning, just do a fresh install and copy the files you need onto the thumb drive and copy back onto the fresh OS.
 
Originally Posted by WagonWheel
This is likely a limitation on the other SATA port on your Lappy or it's not configured correctly in bios. Disk manager can only report what the UEFI / motherboard SATA driver reports.

What drive options are in your bios?

Not sure what you are looking for? Poking around BIOS it appears to allow boot from CD, USB and HD. I see "Legacy" under Boot List Option.

Originally Posted by Nick1994
I wouldn't worry about cloning, just do a fresh install and copy the files you need onto the thumb drive and copy back onto the fresh OS.

I guess that is an option.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
I found the product key (for Windows 7 Pro) under the battery.

So, would I write down that key, burn a thumbdrive, power down, swap drives, then bring up and do a fresh install that way?
 
Try googling "model> enable stata AHCI bios" to see if there are specific instructions.

In the Win device manager, expand the items listed below & see if the SSD name is reported correctly and you have AHCI controllers (no IDE, this would be odd):
[Linked Image]


Then launch powershell from the Start -> Run (you can install it free from Microsoft if not already installed)
run "diskpart"
then "list disk" to see what is reported. See example below:
[Linked Image]
 
Got it now. Made a USB thing that it could boot from, did a fresh install (I think).

Finally found the 116GB problem. After installing, and with only the new drive installed stupid 116GB drive was still there. ???

Yep…

There was a 128GB SD card in the front of the computer.

Oops.

Maybe there is more to this IT stuff than sitting around, drinking coffee and asking people "did you try restarting it first?"

Computer seems slightly faster now, and, because of going into BIOS, I was able to find something that I thought the computer had, but wasn't working--I used to have this model computer years ago, and I recalled it having a backlit keyboard. Turns out, it was disabled in BIOS. Turned it on and voila! a backlit keyboard!

Now if I could just find a BT board to drop into it... upgrade to 8GB... maybe an HDMI output, but let's not get too crazy here!
 
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