Chris Woods wrote: > One thing to keep in mind when recycling your old computer (or selling > it or giving it away): remove the hard disk. Re-formatting is > insufficient to protect your personal data (doubly true of Windows). > Take the hard disk out and physically destroy it (a hammer, safety > goggles, and a hard surface work well for this). If you overwrite the drive using a program like "shred" (GNU/Linux) or any serious disk erasing program, people won't be able to recover your data without *really* knowing what they are doing (electron microscope?)... and even then I don't know if they could get much from a wiped drive. I think that it's better not to throw out hard drives. A Linux live CD should be able to erase the drive with the "shred" command, or use something like this on Windows: http://www.jetico.com/bcwipe3.htm