I have an old computer that I need to give away and want to erase the hard drive, but the floppy drive isn't working. So, none of the usual instructions seem to work.I have searched the archives until I was cross-eyed. It's running Windows ME so I'm even more frustrated. I hate to take a torch to it, but it was used by a non-profit organization and I really need to get rid og that stuff before I give it away.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated - Mags:wacko:

If you have another already working computer, you can just plug up that old hard drive as a slave, and just use the working computer to purge the hard drives data.

There are some FREE tools that will erase all the data on it, making it impossible to restore.

One good program is called Eraser.

You can get it here:
http://www.heidi.ie/eraser/

Download Killdisk and make a CD of it. You will need to go into your BIOS and make you CD-ROM the first boot device and place the disc in the CD-ROM. The next time you turn your computer on it will boot to the CD, follow the prompts and it will over write the information on the hdd.

If you are going to give this relic away without an operating system it is pretty much worthless, especially if it is old enough to be running ME. I wouldn't even fool with the hdd, just take it out and trash it and hope that someone will take the puter for parts. Ever seen what a sawzall will do to one?