Archived from groups: comp.sys.laptops (
More info?)
The answer is still no.
Modern hard drives (both desktop and laptop, and even truly modern
floppy drives (e.g. "Zip" drives)) have servo information written on the
platters in addition to the data. The servo information is permanent,
it's written one time at the factory, never subsequently erased, and the
drive itself is incapable of writing it (in fact, it's analog data).
What you suggest would, if it worked, erase the servo information,
effectively destroying the drive.
However, people don't comprehend the strength of magnetic field required
to alther the data (or servo information) on a drive platter.
I doubt if there is any way to erase a platter while it's in a drive,
short of putting the drive into some "extreme" device in a magnetics
lab, or maybe an MRI machine. The force required can only be produced
in the drive because the head is micro-inches from the platter.
Remember that magnetic fields follow the inverse-square law, and any
field originating even just one inch away will be something like 10**12
(a thousand billion) times weaker than the same field produced at the
read head.
Don't forget that the drive motor, and the head seek mechansim, are
inside the drive, and they have powerful magnets and magnetic fields,
yet they don't bother the data. Magnetically, a hard drive is not at
all fragile, in fact it's just about impossible to do magnetic damage to
the platters, even if you try very, very hard. This also implies no
easy way to "bulk erase" the platters although, again, if you did that,
you'd wipe out the servo data, which would destroy the drive anyway.
M-Tech wrote:
> I didn't see your answer....But no one has answered my question. Maybe
> there isn't an answer but;
>
> I understand that you cannot access the drive electrically(pw and all
> that)...I asked if a electro-mechanical force (like a magnetic field) could
> be used to wipe the drive clean. I would "assume" that the pw data is kept
> on the HD media?
>
> At that point a low-level format could be used to realign the disc
> particles....
>
> IE http
/www.periphman.com/degaussing/
>
> Thoughts?
>
> Don
>
>
>
> "Barry Watzman" <WatzmanNOSPAM@neo.rr.com> wrote in message
> news:4113A3A3.3010202@neo.rr.com...
>
>>I did answer the question. The answer is no, if you don't have the
>>password (or successfully somehow bypass it), the drive is totally
>>non-functional. It can't be used at all, for any purpose whatsoever, it
>>can't even be reformatted. The hard drive password scheme places data
>>security above absolutely everything else. After a power-up or reset,
>>the drive is totally non-functional until the proper password is
>>entered, it isn't even recognized by the bios.
>>
>>
>>M-Tech wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Anybody got an answer for this one? Would it work?
>>>
>>>Thanks
>>>Don
>>>
>>>"M-Tech" <mechtechllc@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>>>news:dZGdndlWH5XKEozcRVn-iA@comcast.com...
>>>
>>>
>>>>Barry, one question;
>>>>
>>>>If a thief wasn't interested in your data, however, you STILL had a pw
>
> on
>
>>>>the hd, could he magnetically/electrically wipe the drive clean, thus
>>>>removing the pw/data and make the hd useable??? Is there some other
>>>>software that would erase/format/low level etc/ the drive so, again, it
>>>>could at LEAST be used?
>>>>
>>>>Thanks
>>>>Don
>>>>
>>>>"Barry Watzman" <WatzmanNOSPAM@neo.rr.com> wrote in message
>>>>news:410FADED.9040804@neo.rr.com...
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>
>
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