How do I reformat my hard drive?

[petegee]

I appreciate that this is a bit of a duff question but can't seem to see an answer on this forum...

I have an old laptop that I'd like to give to charity but need to reformat the hardrive first to get rid of any personal info, etc.

But how do I reformat the hardrive? I think I have found the original 'recovery' CD ROMs which I assume has windows XP on it but when I boot from this, it only seems to give me the option of restoring from a particular date rather than do a reformat?

so what do I need to do?

Cheers!

[andrew1810]

Download this:
http://dban.sourceforge.net/

Put it on a CD and boot from the CD, set to automatic and wait

That will definitely blank it!

[FishBoy]

Method 1:
Take a large magnet. Rub it over the surface of the hard drive. If you do it at the right angle, it should format the drive

Method 2:
Boot to a DOS prompt, then type FORMAT C:

Note: formatting will NOT remove any personal data. Data is very easily recoverable from a formatted drive, for someone with a little technical knowledge. You're better off getting a proper file eraser, like this one: http://www.tolvanen.com/eraser/. This will overwrite your files with random data, thus preventing its recovery.

[andrew1810]

Darik's Boot and Nuke overwrites as part of the format, I've used it a few times and its an excellent program.

[petegee]

Many thanks I'll give dban a go over the weekend!