dban

[stinkoman]

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i picked up a computer and it was running some sort of linux (far before i knew what linux was) and it had a CD with DBAN written on it.i can post the names of all of the files if it will help, but i dont know what it means, or if i can use it, any insight?

[Manchunian]

Dban will erase the hard disk.

[stinkoman]

i accidntally figured that out about 6 minutes ago...

[Manchunian]

Hope you've lost nothing valuable?

[i92guboj]

I don't know what dban does, but if the data hasn't been overwritten, there's a good chance that you can restore your partitions using testdisk. You will need a bootable media that has it. Alternatively, you can boot from any linux minimal cd with net connection and download an statically linked version of testdisk from here:

http://www.cgsecurity.org/testdisk-6...inux26.tar.bz2

[Manchunian]

I don't think this'll work. Dban is pretty radical and testdisk is a good recovery disk for deletion due to error. Here is an interesting article about it.

When DBAN is finished with your hard drives, the master boot record, partition table, and every sector of the drive will have been overwritten in accordance with one of five well-regarded industry guidelines. DBAN is powerful stuff and has been used by US federal agencies, such as the Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), to prepare machines for disposal.

I don't fancy his chances of getting it back!

[i92guboj]

I don't think this'll work. Dban is pretty radical and testdisk is a good recovery disk for deletion due to error. Here is an interesting article about it.



I don't fancy his chances of getting it back!

Then, we shall better leave it to "Requiescat In Pace". If it overwrote everything there's little you can do. All I hope is that there was nothing important in there.

[stinkoman]

yeah nothing important just basic install on slackware

[stinkoman]

will dban get rid of grub from my mbr to let me reinstall os's?

[Manchunian]

When Dban finishes its work you have nothing left at all on your desk. You'll be able to install anything you want and partition the disk as you wish.