[rescue] Degaussing Drives? That would be interesting!

[Pastorel Alexoaie]

    I have recovered entire partitions after low-level formatting. Low-level
formatting has nothing to do with the data on the hdd (same as FORMAT, btw),
but with the extra info used internaly (ie servo track) and is only usable
for hdd with heads driven by step motors where the mechanics could
'decalibrate' so the heads an not reading the tracks correctly-they have to
be rewritten where the head 'heads' for data. Modern hdd do not have the
servo track, cause heads are self aligning on tracks using the data track
itself, that's why modern mainboards do not have this option in the BIOS.
Also producers say that hdd should be NOT low level formatted.
    Consider using SpeedDisk with the option 'Wipe free space' on, WipeInfo
itself, or googling after such utilities, or filling the disk with
multimedia files (the same file, in different folders), deleting them, and
again. You can change the files every time - see the size of the cluster and
append some binary if necessary. Which is the DoD requirements, three times
with three overwrites each time? It would be much faster than checking if
'degaussing' worked, and shurely works.
     Considering the SCSI card, you can do about 6 or more hdd at the time,
so this wouldn't take really a long time.
     I'm wondering how come you did not think of a microwave owen, for sure
you see one more often that a degausser? ;-) But anyway, if you do that,
please post the results here, damn I'd die to do it myself (and to be paid
for!).

Regards
Pasto


----- Original Message -----
From: Stephen D. B. Wolthusen <stephen at wolthusen.com>
To: <rescue at sunhelp.org>
Sent: Monday, August 26, 2002 9:45 AM
Subject: RE: [rescue] Degaussing Drives?


> Hi,
>
> On 26-Aug-2002 Bob Chu wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > Anyone out there know much about Degausing Hard Drives?
> > The Story is:
> > At my workplace, they need 30 or so Hard Drives low level formatted.
> > They delegated this task to me, however his would take forever
> > (considering I only work about 10 hours a week as a Student Worker, and
1
> > available SCSI card for me to do the task)  While walking around in the
> > Tech shop (Equipment/Electronics Maintenance) I bumped into an odd
device,
> > that the Technicians told me is a Degausser used back in the 80's to
clean
> > tapes (no one who is around now, actually seen it used) .  So I got the
> > idea perhaps this will work on Hard Drives.  But
> > before I begin, I just wanted to see if anyone knows anything about this
> > kind of stuff.  Will this permantly damage hard drives (ie. screwing the
> > motor up, Heads, etc).  How long do I need to leave a hard drive on it
to
> > make the data on the drive corrupted?  The degausser has all sorts of
> > user put labels warning about fuse blowings after 4 mins of continuous
> > use, etc, so I assume its pretty powerful?  The degausser is a Apex
Model
> > 111, Cat no. 13634-01 in case anyones intrested.
>
> You don't degauss modern hard drives if you want to reuse them. Standard
> procedure is to open the drive before degaussing (the aluminum casing
> typically used doesn't matter) if you don't have a sufficiently powerful
> degausser; the disks are very likely to be toast at any rate (since
> you're erasing the factory-installed servo tracks; as far as I'm aware of
no
> modern drive has the ability to recreate, i.e. low-level format in the
> traditional sense, these tracks).
>
> Degaussers, except heavy duty units, are not meant to operate
continuously, so
> that's perfectly normal. Duty cycles range from 1-5 minutes depending on
the
> degausser.
>
> If you are in fact low-level formatting you should be aware of the fact
that
> media can be read after such a procedure, in most cases even after
multiple
> overwrites.
> .
>
> --
>
>         later,
>         Stephen
>
> Stephen Wolthusen (stephen at wolthusen.com)
> _______________________________________________
> rescue list - http://www.sunhelp.org/mailman/listinfo/rescue
>


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