Want to utterly destroy the data on your HDD? Use UPS! - Page 2

Olle P · 1st Feb 2006, 05:41 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Adrian Wong

Yeah, data can still be pulled from the platters. Shock will kill the hard drive but not the data on the platters.

I just go by the article:

Quote:

The first drive came from a laptop that had tumbled off a coffee table and onto a hardwood floor. After the fall the drive wouldn't boot, but in all likelihood most of the data was intact. The second was a Samsung SpinPoint drive that simply crashed one day—out of the blue. When we tried to reboot, it did nothing but click incessantly. Obviously, some sort of internal mechanism was damaged, but again, we couldn't imagine that much of the data had come to grief.

So far everything should still be readable, once the electronics and mechanics have been fixed, but...

Quote:

Unfortunately, we asked Dan to pack up the drives and mail them out. He tossed them into an envelope, slapped on an address, and dropped them into the office UPS bin. No padding. No Styrofoam peanuts. Nothing. The drives were free to bounce around like marbles in a pinball machine all the way from New York City to Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

... each platter holds billions of tiny magnetized data regions, or bits. Magnetically oriented in one direction, ... As long as the original orientations are intact, engineers can typically read a block of data. But it's easy to scramble those magnetic orientations or physically damage the bit regions. When this happens, the data is lost forever.

By the time it arrived at Ontrack, the laptop drive was completely shot. Too many of the bits had turned and the engineers couldn't recover a single file. As for the SpinPoint drive, they retrieved only a quarter of the files, and the overall data structure, including individual filenames, was beyond recovery.

So too many individual bits had been scrambled beyond recognition.
As they sum it up:

Quote:

... as our laptop and SpinPoint drives tumbled around the planes, trains, and automobiles carrying them across the country, far too many of the bits were scrambled or damaged. ... About 26 percent of those magnetic orientations were still intact on the Spinpoint, but on the laptop drive, almost none of them survived.

Thus, the data is gone!

/Olle

Womb-Raider · 1st Feb 2006, 07:49 AM

Well then just take it out and give it a good hammering! when you think youve done enough damage KILL IT AGAIN!!!!!

or seperate the platters and send em to a burial at sea...

That ought to do it.....(lol)

Womb-Raider · 1st Feb 2006, 07:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Olle P

I just go by the article:So far everything should still be readable, once the electronics and mechanics have been fixed, but...So too many individual bits had been scrambled beyond recognition.
As they sum it up:
Thus, the data is gone!

/Olle

Ironic considering the laptop drive was designed to be mobile!

PsYkHoTiK · 1st Feb 2006, 08:17 AM

lol UPS can destroy ur hdd too judging by how some of my received UPS shipped packages arrive...

luqman · 1st Feb 2006, 09:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Olle P

With UPS I don't mean "Uninterrupted Power Supply", but "United Parcel Service" (or any other parcel transporter, for that sake).

Put the harddrive in an unpadded box or envelope and send it across the continent. When it arrives at the destination you can be pretty sure that any data previously stored on the drive (as well as the drive itself) is FUBAR.

Source: PCMag article: Hard Drive Healers.

Cheers
Olle

there is this special dusting proccess i dunno what it is called but u litterly dust off the 0's and 1's pretty expensive i heard

i'll find an article on that

jamotto · 1st Feb 2006, 02:24 PM

Hard drive platter + Bottle of Draino(Sodium hydroxide) = no more data

Majormaggot · 2nd Feb 2006, 08:58 AM

harddrive + sledge hammer + one bad day at work = no more data

harddrive + explosives = no more data....

how hard (and fun) is that??

PsYkHoTiK · 2nd Feb 2006, 01:38 PM

You could also do this...

http://www.bbspot.com/News/2004/05/b...ice_drive.html

Magicky · 2nd Feb 2006, 02:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PsYkHoTiK

You could also do this...

http://www.bbspot.com/News/2004/05/b...ice_drive.html

And to further quote...
"BBspot Labs does recommend not trying this at home, unless you have completely embedded computer components in a block of ice before."

Best laugh I've had in a while....

Chai · 2nd Feb 2006, 06:49 PM

LMAO! The best way to remove evidence!

1st Feb 2006, 08:17 AM	#14 (permalink)
PsYkHoTiK "Little" Devil Join Date: 8 Apr 2004 Location: On the "throne" Posts: 14,385 Reputation: 4069 Rep Power: 59	lol UPS can destroy ur hdd too judging by how some of my received UPS shipped packages arrive... __________________ Intel SLAPL 4.3GHz @ 1.35v : 2x2GB OCZ Platinum DDR2 1066 : Asus P5K Premium : WD RE3 250GB x2 RAID 0 : 3ware 9650SE-2LP : G92 8800GTS 512mb 820MHz Core : XFi Platinum : Silverstone OP650 : Silverstone TJ-07 : Dtek FuZion CPU : Swiftech MCW60 : MCP655 : Thermochill PA120.3 w Scythe Ultra Kaze CPU-Z: SLAPL : SLA9U : FX-55 : DDR 600 : VX www.techarp.com PsYkHoTiK's Meanderings

2nd Feb 2006, 08:58 AM	#17 (permalink)
Majormaggot Getting there Join Date: 5 Sep 2005 Posts: 166 Reputation: 59 Rep Power: 4	harddrive + sledge hammer + one bad day at work = no more data harddrive + explosives = no more data.... how hard (and fun) is that?? __________________ Intel Pentium Dual Core E2160 @ 3.1 GHz 1.475 Vcore, Asus P5W DH Deluxe, 2GB Corsair XMS twin X 2, enermax galaxy 850w, Sound blaster X-FI Xtream Music, XFX 8800GT 512 MB, 2x 400GB Seagate HDD in Raid 0, 1x 250 GB WD HDD, 1x 120 GB WD HDD, A mighty Zalman 9500 cooler crying for help. and ArcticSliver 5, DVD drives n shizzle.

2nd Feb 2006, 01:38 PM	#18 (permalink)
PsYkHoTiK "Little" Devil Join Date: 8 Apr 2004 Location: On the "throne" Posts: 14,385 Reputation: 4069 Rep Power: 59	You could also do this... http://www.bbspot.com/News/2004/05/b...ice_drive.html __________________ Intel SLAPL 4.3GHz @ 1.35v : 2x2GB OCZ Platinum DDR2 1066 : Asus P5K Premium : WD RE3 250GB x2 RAID 0 : 3ware 9650SE-2LP : G92 8800GTS 512mb 820MHz Core : XFi Platinum : Silverstone OP650 : Silverstone TJ-07 : Dtek FuZion CPU : Swiftech MCW60 : MCP655 : Thermochill PA120.3 w Scythe Ultra Kaze CPU-Z: SLAPL : SLA9U : FX-55 : DDR 600 : VX www.techarp.com PsYkHoTiK's Meanderings

2nd Feb 2006, 06:49 PM	#20 (permalink)
Chai Administrator Join Date: 6 Oct 2002 Location: Maranello Posts: 26,978 Reputation: 4108 Rep Power: 74	LMAO! The best way to remove evidence! __________________ Chai (Contributor & Forum Admin) http://www.techarp.com/

1st Feb 2006, 07:49 AM	#12 (permalink)
Womb-Raider Newbie Join Date: 25 Jan 2006 Posts: 19 Reputation: 4 Rep Power: 0	Well then just take it out and give it a good hammering! when you think youve done enough damage KILL IT AGAIN!!!!! or seperate the platters and send em to a burial at sea... That ought to do it.....(lol)

1st Feb 2006, 02:24 PM	#16 (permalink)
jamotto I'm a regular Join Date: 3 Mar 2005 Posts: 471 Reputation: 142 Rep Power: 5	Hard drive platter + Bottle of Draino(Sodium hydroxide) = no more data