Can I wipe it without connecting to the Internet?
If not which bit do I need to remove, do charities want big old buffer computers or I shall I scrap it.

Remove hard disc
Hit (several times) with a big hammer
Bin the lot

Or download dban onto a USB stick and wipe the drive’s, but nuking from orbit is the only way to be sure
(Dban pretty well approved of, though they’ve gotten all corporate on the site, ignore the ‘warning’)

Which bit is the hard drive?

Remove hard disc
Hit (several times) with a big hammer

Might as well smear it in orange jelly, it’ll be about as secure as that approach.

Use DBAN. Then take it to a recycling centre.

Which bit is the hard drive?

Looks like you’ve got two in there. In the bays on the right of the picture, below the CD/DVD drive.

http://www.wikihow.com/Destroy-a-Hard-Drive

We want photos though

Call local pc recycling charity and ask if the spec is any use. If so dban HDD and take it. If not and HDD is ant good then remove it and put in a USB or network box and scrap the rest or dban and scrap.

Just a few screws to open a hard drive and destroy the platter.

Of course the entire of STW is now dying to know what sickness you have on your hard drive.

Northwind – Member
Of course the entire of STW is now dying to know what sickness you have on your hard drive.

POSTED 7 MINUTES AGO # REPORT-POST
Slug sex, pure hard core filth.

You can sell any old tat on ebay, honest. I’m looking for an AGP graphics card just to run an old rig in the loft on, the prices people want for 15 year old cards is ridiculous.

As said DBAN all the way, I have no problem selling drives I’ve processed using that.

All that stuff will be useful to someone, stick it on Gumtree or Freecycle/Freegle and someone will have it. Better than wasting it IMO. Actually, it has SATA, it can’t be that old!

Actually, it has SATA, it can’t be that old!

I’ve a near-identical ASUS board sat in a PC next to me here (also an AM2 socket I think) acting as a home server. If I was to guess I’d say it’s about 12 years old.

EDIT – Googling the board model visible in the OP suggests 2007 vintage.

Cougar

Remove hard disc
Hit (several times) with a big hammer

Might as well smear it in orange jelly, it’ll be about as secure as that approach[/quote]

If we were talking about a hard drive that was being sought by NSA/Mi6/Spectre (*delete as appropriate) Agents and which contained the lauch codes for Balistic Nuclear Missiles then yes, i’d agree, a hammer ‘might’ not be enough.

However, in reality, as soon as the drive is rendered non working with a hammer, the chances some one will attempt to reconstruct the data on the remains of the platters is tiny, as it is a massive PITA to do.

A few good hits with the hammer, make sure the casing is proper bent so the platters inside are bent too and take it to your local tip that has an electronics recycling capability!

I’ve tried the hammer method. They’re surprisingly robust. Far easier to DBAN it (especially when met with questions like “which bit is the hard drive?”) though, I grant you, less fun.

In the financial world overwriting is not considered good enough. Shredding us normal after DBAN or equivalent. Otherwise drill a few holes through the hard drive.

Alternatively, as GCHQ has already pwnd all the computers in the UK, don’t do a thing 😉

Angle grinder?