Actually, I am retrieving files from a twice-formatted hard drive right now.
I am using OnTrack's EasyRecovery/DataRecovery in FormatRecovery mode. It
gets almost everything back. Not bad for a $199.00 program. Including the
Protected Storage (all the passwords). So maybe taking a sledgehammer to
the sucka and burying it under a prickly pear cactus plant is not so
outlandish an idea.

--
Colin Barnhorst [MVP Windows - Virtual Machine]
(Reply to the group only unless otherwise requested)
"Ken Blake" wrote in message
...
In ,
John John typed:

I can assure you that with a 3 pass wipe no one will be able to
retrieve anything from your drive unless they hire data recovery
specialists and spend thousands of dollars, and even then they may
recover nothing. I can further assure you that with a DOD or Gutmann
wipe no one will be able to retrieve anything unless they spend tens
of thousands of dollars and even then they may be left empty handed
with empty pockets! Unless you work for the CIA or MI5 and have
state secrets on your drive no one would bother spending that kind of
money trying to retrieve anything that might turn out to be nothing
more than emails to Grandma and a list of your favorite recipes, if
they indeed can recover anything.


Exactly right! Many people worry far too much about these things. For the
vast majority of people, even simply formatting the drive is sufficient.
Yes, it's possible to retrieve data after a format, but first you have to
know how, and second, you have to want to. Unless there's something
special about you and what you have on your drive, it's highly unlikely
that some criminal will single out your thrown-away computer to search
your drive for your darkest secrets.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
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