PC help please

[LIG]

Need to remove all personal data from my lappy before trading it in. Never having "sold" one before, (I still have every PC I've ever bought stored away somewhere, win95 desktops too ) I wanted to know what methods are available for erasing personal stuff, which methods are easy and which are most secure. Is there such a thing as a "Factory Reset" similar to smartphones, more importantly, is it secure?

Any help greatly appreciated.

Also, Please assume I'm a tech dunderhead and need my hand held through any process.

 

[Blue in Munich]

Fragger's your man, maybe a PM?

 

[full_throttle]

This may help

 

[LIG]

Richard & Rob

 

[PhilTheFragger]

The link from FT is fine if you want to wipe the entire machine and reload windows from scratch,

But that will wipe out the programs like office which makes it less desirable for the purchaser.

You can wipe your data quite easily retaining windows and programs.

1 create a new user profile, make it an administrator.

2 log into this new user profile

3 delete your old profile including data files

4 empty the recycle bin

5 download Glary Utilities, it’s free and you then need to wipe the computers free space.

The program does multiple passes so can take a while.

Shout if you get stuck 👍

 

[jim8flog]

There is a simple factory reset if you were supplied with the original system CD or the Back up is kept on a separate disk partition (Acers do this and how to reset was in the manual)

 

[LIG]

The link from FT is fine if you want to wipe the entire machine and reload windows from scratch,

But that will wipe out the programs like office which makes it less desirable for the purchaser.

You can wipe your data quite easily retaining windows and programs.

1 create a new user profile, make it an administrator.

2 log into this new user profile

3 delete your old profile including data files

4 empty the recycle bin

5 download Glary Utilities, it’s free and you then need to wipe the computers free space.

The program does multiple passes so can take a while.

Shout if you get stuck 👍

Thanks Phil.

Working on it tonight

 

[LIG]

There is a simple factory reset if you were supplied with the original system CD or the Back up is kept on a separate disk partition (Acers do this and how to reset was in the manual)

Found one. May use that instead.
Ta

 

[rulefan]

Need to remove all personal data from my lappy before trading it in. Never having "sold" one before, (I still have every PC I've ever bought stored away somewhere, win95 desktops too ) I wanted to know what methods are available for erasing personal stuff, which methods are easy and which are most secure. Is there such a thing as a "Factory Reset" similar to smartphones, more importantly, is it secure?

Any help greatly appreciated.

Also, Please assume I'm a tech dunderhead and need my hand held through any process.

Have a look at this from Microsoft

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/p/shredder8/9wzdncrdqzzf#activetab=pivot:overviewtab

 

[LIG]

Q: Will using one of these utilities several times improve the wipe/deletion over using just once?

 

[Bunkermagnet]

Q: Will using one of these utilities several times improve the wipe/deletion over using just once?

My understanding is that information or programs aren’t “wiped”, but overwritten with “0”s and “1”s making the information unreadable. The more passes made and thus more overwriting the harder it is to recover the information you are writing over.

I use a wiping program called Tracks Eraser Pro, and you can specify how many passes it makes for wiping where you can go from just 1, through paranoia to US defence level standard.

What I did when I have got rid of a laptop, was to take the hard drive out and mount it in a caddy then connect it to my desktop via a USB, then ran my wiping program to totally remove everything on the hard drive to be sure all personal data was gone, and that includes serial numbers relating to my house..

 

[rulefan]

Q: Will using one of these utilities several times improve the wipe/deletion over using just once?

Virtually all do multiple passes. I can select 1 to 7 using Sys Shield "shreder.exe"

 

[LIG]

Thanks evryone for your advice.

In the end I followed Fragger's method and did the wipe twice.
Not sure that it was the best method as I could still find a folder relating to an old user profile but Geary Utils couldn't remove it as it was "not found".

Ah well, did what I could and it's gone now - traded it in against a Macbook Air that someone wanted. That's £200 trade-in and I only paid £270 for it three years ago. Result!!