Re: DBAN on Macs??
Things that make you go Hm... An item in today's MacOSXHints about securely erasing files included this link http://tinyurl.com/7hppm8 which is a scholarly paper on this exact topic. They looked at hard drives with atomic force microscopes, measuring the 'residual' data that is supposedly recoverable, and found that one pass was sufficient to make a drive essentially unreadable. (If the url is not reachable, a pdf of the article is here: http://dbdev2.pharmacy.arizona.edu/miscjunk/wright_etal.pdf ) VERY interesting reading; I like folks who do good 'ol hands on science. Now we start verging on the dimmer recesses of why this apparent myth is so deeply engrained. Perhaps un-named TLA agencies are pushing out misinformation to hide their true sources and methods? We were able to recover data forensically after we got a search warrant is MUCH more convincing on the stand than We hacked his system before we had a search warrant. or Well, since we monitor all electronic traffic in the continental U completely contrary to law and our charter, we'll tell you we got it in the lab... Or actually how this is really handled on the Hill: We tell the Intelligence Committee it's a Defense project, and we tell the Defense Committee it's an Intelligence project -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Wed, Jan 28, 2009 at 3:56 PM, Bruce Johnson john...@pharmacy.arizona.edu wrote: That said, the Internet Archive uses hard drives and DLT tape http://www.archive.org/about/about.php#storage Yeah, but their service is often incredibly slow and that's if you're lucky and don't get a error message saying Oh no I can't connect to the server where this data is supposedly housed!. It sounds like they should try to poach one of Google's engineers and fix up their cup and string setup with something much more robust and resilient. To be honest although it's a nice service to have, the low amount of integrity provided by the service makes it a bit of a pita to use ..I definitely wouldn't use the service as a representation of something you should model your backup plan after. -- Best Regards, John Musbach --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 27, 2009, at 10:02 PM, Kris Tilford wrote: I'd guess an MRI would ruin and magnetic media also if the media got close enough. Interestingly, Rolex manufactures a non-magnetic watch for use in high magnetic field industries such as aluminum smelting or MRI operator. Given that MRI systems have hard drives inside of them, and we have computers within 15 feet of high frequency (and hence high powered magnets...ours use helium-cooled superconducting magnets) NMR systems leads me to believe that this wouldn't be so reliable :-) On the other hand, these systems are just fine and dandy for scrambling every.damn.credit.card in your wallet if you forget to store it outside somewhere. That's a VERY embarrassing situation to be in, when you're standing at the checkout line, trying card after card after card, getting nowhere. And no, nope, never happened to me nuh uh! 8-P -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
Bruce Johnson wrote: On Jan 27, 2009, at 10:02 PM, Kris Tilford wrote: I'd guess an MRI would ruin and magnetic media also if the media got close enough. Interestingly, Rolex manufactures a non-magnetic watch for use in high magnetic field industries such as aluminum smelting or MRI operator. Given that MRI systems have hard drives inside of them, and we have computers within 15 feet of high frequency (and hence high powered magnets...ours use helium-cooled superconducting magnets) NMR systems leads me to believe that this wouldn't be so reliable :-) On the other hand, these systems are just fine and dandy for scrambling every.damn.credit.card in your wallet if you forget to store it outside somewhere. That's a VERY embarrassing situation to be in, when you're standing at the checkout line, trying card after card after card, getting nowhere. And no, nope, never happened to me nuh uh! 8-P IIRC the NMR spectrometer I worked around had a hard disk drive, the kind you loaded a stack of 12 (or so) platters into. Very Retro. The drive was on the far end of the console from the magnet. And watch out that the NMR doesn't suck the keys right out of your fingers. I heard stories about that. I did see one quench once, kind of spectacular. -- Clark Martin Redwood City, CA, USA Macintosh / Internet Consulting I'm a designated driver on the Information Super Highway --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
At 11:02 PM -0600 1/27/2009, Kris Tilford wrote: I'd guess an MRI would ruin and magnetic media also if the media got close enough. The safety issue aside (google comes up with some very cool pics of things stuck to MRI machines!)... it wouldn't work. The erasure would be inconsistent, leaving a high likelihood that at least some data could be recovered. - Dan. -- - Psychoceramic Emeritus; South Jersey, USA, Earth --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 28, 2009, at 1:38 PM, John Callahan wrote: On Jan 27, 2009, at 11:11 PM, Dan wrote: At 9:53 PM -0600 1/27/2009, Kris Tilford wrote: Isn't that 7 Passes, a DoD (Department of Defense-iveness) government hoopla/hangup/thingy? snip I guess that if some one wanted to archive something forever a hard drive would be the way to do it? I'm guessing that the above is John speaking, not Dan, but sort of, yes. Data is recoverable off of hard drives, forever is a long time though. I would not reccomend to sorts of data recovery we're talking about here as an archival medium. That said, if a hard drive contains research data it would cost a rival several million dollars to duplicate, spending a couple of grand on some disk forensics is cheap. The UA does it because we're obligated by state law to prevent personal or confidential data from being disseminated. We do a hell of a lot better than most folks, though: http://www.simson.net/clips/academic/2003.IEEE.DiskDriveForensics.pdf They found data off of reformatted drives they bought on the open market, using commonly accessible tools to do it. Simson Garfinkel quite literally wrote the book on Unix and internet security: http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596003234/index.html This has been the bible of unix security for over a decade now. That said, the Internet Archive uses hard drives and DLT tape http://www.archive.org/about/about.php#storage -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
Dban works great on pc's. I use it at work. I didn't even know that there was a version that supposedly worked on ppc. What about booting into a flavor of linux to format drives?-Jonas On Mon, Jan 26, 2009 at 9:19 PM, Brian Christmas b...@tpg.com.au wrote: On 27/01/2009, at 4:07 PM, Bruce Johnson wrote: On Jan 26, 2009, at 9:53 PM, Charles Davis wrote: Hi Bruce; Are the G3s new enough for firewire external? If not, the same thing can be done with a SCSI external. Setup the external drive with a bootable OSX, boot that and run Disk Utility to wipe the installed drive. Well for that I can just boot off the system CD and do it that way. My issue is that Disk Utility doesn't offer anything between just writing zeros across the drive and doing an 8-way secure erase which takes way too long. -- Bruce Johnson U of Az College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions don't have opinions, merely customs G'day Bruce From the dim, dark recesses of my feeble mind I remember reading somewhere that Apple tried a 4 and 8 pass choice, but 4 passes did not fully erase the drive, hence the only choice of 8 passes for a full, secure erasure when disposing of a drive, and a single pass if you intended to re-use the drive yourself. Might be faster to DD (dismantle and destroy). Regards Santa --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 27, 2009, at 12:19 AM, Brian Christmas wrote: G'day Bruce From the dim, dark recesses of my feeble mind I remember reading somewhere that Apple tried a 4 and 8 pass choice, but 4 passes did not fully erase the drive, hence the only choice of 8 passes for a full, secure erasure when disposing of a drive, and a single pass if you intended to re-use the drive yourself. Might be faster to DD (dismantle and destroy). I'm late to this thread, but I'd thought I'd ask: Why isn't 1 Pass, Writing Zeroes, sufficient to wipe a disk clean? Isn't that 7 Passes, a DoD (Department of Defense-iveness) government hoopla / hangup / thingy? Something to give government workers something else useless to do? (I use to work for the General Accounting Office). Apologies to current government workers in advance. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 27, 2009, at 9:25 PM, Bill Connelly wrote: Why isn't 1 Pass, Writing Zeroes, sufficient to wipe a disk clean? There exists special hardware/software that can scan a disk for the strength of the magnetism of each individual bit. There is a residual magnetism each time a bit is erased. As an example, if the residual was 10% (a convenient size for this example), and the initial bits were 0 and 1 (relative values), then the first write would be 1, and the first erase would be 0.1 (10% residual charge). The second write would be 1.1 and the second erase would be 0.11. After a series of reads writes, the actual value of the magnetism of each bit retains a record of its past values within the exact magnetism. In this artificially convenient example, the values will only be 1's or 0's, so if you measured the value of a bit as 1.0110111 this would tell you that the current value is 1, the the previous seven values were 0,1,1,0,1,1,1 respectively. It's not this simple in real life, but theoretically you can reconstruct erased and rewritten data. Isn't that 7 Passes, a DoD (Department of Defense-iveness) government hoopla/hangup/thingy? I've read somewhere the CIA or someone had the precision to get the previous 13 read/write cycles. I'd guess this is really difficult, but what do I know, perhaps it's been automated? --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 27, 2009, at 10:53 PM, Kris Tilford wrote: On Jan 27, 2009, at 9:25 PM, Bill Connelly wrote: Why isn't 1 Pass, Writing Zeroes, sufficient to wipe a disk clean? There exists special hardware/software that can scan a disk for the strength of the magnetism of each individual bit. There is a residual magnetism each time a bit is erased. As an example, if the residual was 10% (a convenient size for this example), and the initial bits were 0 and 1 (relative values), then the first write would be 1, and the first erase would be 0.1 (10% residual charge). The second write would be 1.1 and the second erase would be 0.11. After a series of reads writes, the actual value of the magnetism of each bit retains a record of its past values within the exact magnetism. In this artificially convenient example, the values will only be 1's or 0's, so if you measured the value of a bit as 1.0110111 this would tell you that the current value is 1, the the previous seven values were 0,1,1,0,1,1,1 respectively. It's not this simple in real life, but theoretically you can reconstruct erased and rewritten data. Isn't that 7 Passes, a DoD (Department of Defense-iveness) government hoopla/hangup/thingy? I've read somewhere the CIA or someone had the precision to get the previous 13 read/write cycles. I'd guess this is really difficult, but what do I know, perhaps it's been automated? OIC. Maybe an MRI would do it. Bill Connelly artsite: http://mysite.verizon.net/moonstoneartstudio myspace: http://www.myspace.com/moonstoneartstudio --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On 28/01/2009, at 2:25 PM, Bill Connelly wrote: On Jan 27, 2009, at 12:19 AM, Brian Christmas wrote: G'day Bruce From the dim, dark recesses of my feeble mind I remember reading somewhere that Apple tried a 4 and 8 pass choice, but 4 passes did not fully erase the drive, hence the only choice of 8 passes for a full, secure erasure when disposing of a drive, and a single pass if you intended to re-use the drive yourself. Might be faster to DD (dismantle and destroy). I'm late to this thread, but I'd thought I'd ask: Why isn't 1 Pass, Writing Zeroes, sufficient to wipe a disk clean? Isn't that 7 Passes, a DoD (Department of Defense-iveness) government hoopla / hangup / thingy? Something to give government workers something else useless to do? (I use to work for the General Accounting Office). Apologies to current government workers in advance. G'day Bill There's been a lot of debate over the years about how many passes will actually 'wipe' a drive, and the USA DoD asks for three zeroing passes. Tiger offered up to 35 passes, as well as 7 and 1. http://support.apple.com/kb/TA24002?viewlocale=en_US If I can correctly remember the article I read some years ago, Apple (or a 3rd party) found partial info recoverable after three zeroings. In dispute of this, though, read... http://tinyurl.com/d7voj6 Regards Santa --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 27, 2009, at 8:25 PM, Bill Connelly wrote: I'm late to this thread, but I'd thought I'd ask: Why isn't 1 Pass, Writing Zeroes, sufficient to wipe a disk clean? Because one pass is relatively easy to undo. Hard drives are like palimpsests: you can recover 'old' data underneath the existing data. Writing just zeroes to the drive makes it about as trivial a recovery as this stuff gets. Isn't that 7 Passes, a DoD (Department of Defense-iveness) government hoopla / hangup / thingy? Something to give government workers something else useless to do? Uh, no, something to keep confidential information from falling onto the hands of whoever buys this surplus gear. Most companies don't even do that...they physically destroy drives instead of surplusing them. (I use to work for the General Accounting Office). Thanks for making those of us who work hard and take our responsibilities to the public trust look bad. :-( -- Bruce Johnson U of Az College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions don't have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
At 9:53 PM -0600 1/27/2009, Kris Tilford wrote: Isn't that 7 Passes, a DoD (Department of Defense-iveness) government hoopla/hangup/thingy? I've read somewhere the CIA or someone had the precision to get the previous 13 read/write cycles. I'd guess this is really difficult, but what do I know, perhaps it's been automated? Not CIA. One of those other agencies. :) It was being done 20 years ago. The read-head sensitivity has only gotten better. At one point, we were required to do a multi-pass galloping erase. That means first you write zeros, then ones, then a shifting bit pattern, then zeros, then ones, then,... But even that wasn't enough. That's why today some projects require that the HDA be cracked open, the platters removed, acid washed, then shredded -- AFTER the erase and degauss is done. Sounds like an extreme... but you have to consider the importance of the data. You have to secure it just farther than the enemy is willing to go to retrieve it. Shredding begat finer shredding begat cross shredding begat burn bags begat things like acid washing of ashes... - Dan. -- - Psychoceramic Emeritus; South Jersey, USA, Earth --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 27, 2009, at 10:02 PM, insightinmind wrote: Maybe an MRI would do it. I've seen powerful electo-magnets with small slots that you were supposed to pass magnetic media through the slot for a total erase cycle instantly. I don't think these were meant for HDs, but who knows? I'd guess an MRI would ruin and magnetic media also if the media got close enough. Interestingly, Rolex manufactures a non-magnetic watch for use in high magnetic field industries such as aluminum smelting or MRI operator. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
DBAN on Macs??
Has anyone ever gotten DBAN http://www.dban.org/ to work on Macs. I just re-downloaded their alleged PPC iso, burned it, but I have never gotten it to boot. I keep finding references to it working but it never has for me, on a variety of systems. I'm looking for a happier medium between just erasing the drives and the it'll take a day and a half Apple 8-way secure method. Right now I'm cheating and using the 'Write zeros to the drive' even though our official policy is a 4-way overwrite. -- Bruce Johnson University of Arizona College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions do not have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 26, 2009, at 5:21 PM, John Musbach wrote: On Mon, Jan 26, 2009 at 5:38 PM, Bruce Johnson john...@pharmacy.arizona.edu wrote: Right now I'm cheating and using the 'Write zeros to the drive' even though our official policy is a 4-way overwrite. Yikes, I hope none of your colleagues read this list. :O Meh, I sent a similar question to the campus Mac admins group. Wouldn't be the first time I waged a minor skirmish over policy with the central IT folks, who tend to pretend that the campus is 105% Windows...:-/ I just wish the damn thing would work as advertised :-( DBAN is very useful for the Intel-based systems. Maybe I should see if there's a live Darwin CD or something... -- Bruce Johnson U of Az College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions don't have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
Howdy, I use dban and have installed it for several customers. I have never seen it work on anything but a generic x86 PC, like those used for declining OSes like Windows or for Linux. You don't need a very up to date one, or an operating system installed. I have used it to wipe a bunch of Mac hard drives. Good luck, Ralph On Mon, 2009-01-26 at 15:38 -0700, Bruce Johnson wrote: Has anyone ever gotten DBAN http://www.dban.org/ to work on Macs. I just re-downloaded their alleged PPC iso, burned it, but I have never gotten it to boot. --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 26, 2009, at 10:52 PM, Bruce Johnson wrote: On Jan 26, 2009, at 8:42 PM, Ralph Green wrote: Howdy, I use dban and have installed it for several customers. I have never seen it work on anything but a generic x86 PC, like those used for declining OSes like Windows or for Linux. You don't need a very up to date one, or an operating system installed. I have used it to wipe a bunch of Mac hard drives. Well, the DBAN site explicitly lists a PowerPC download, and the systems I'm wiping are old G3 iMacs...I DON'T want to spend the time required to dig out the ^...@$%# drives just to erase 'em :-) Hi Bruce; Are the G3s new enough for firewire external? If not, the same thing can be done with a SCSI external. Setup the external drive with a bootable OSX, boot that and run Disk Utility to wipe the installed drive. HTH Chuck D. -- Bruce Johnson U of Az College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions don't have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On Jan 26, 2009, at 9:53 PM, Charles Davis wrote: Hi Bruce; Are the G3s new enough for firewire external? If not, the same thing can be done with a SCSI external. Setup the external drive with a bootable OSX, boot that and run Disk Utility to wipe the installed drive. Well for that I can just boot off the system CD and do it that way. My issue is that Disk Utility doesn't offer anything between just writing zeros across the drive and doing an 8-way secure erase which takes way too long. -- Bruce Johnson U of Az College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions don't have opinions, merely customs --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
Re: DBAN on Macs??
On 27/01/2009, at 4:07 PM, Bruce Johnson wrote: On Jan 26, 2009, at 9:53 PM, Charles Davis wrote: Hi Bruce; Are the G3s new enough for firewire external? If not, the same thing can be done with a SCSI external. Setup the external drive with a bootable OSX, boot that and run Disk Utility to wipe the installed drive. Well for that I can just boot off the system CD and do it that way. My issue is that Disk Utility doesn't offer anything between just writing zeros across the drive and doing an 8-way secure erase which takes way too long. -- Bruce Johnson U of Az College of Pharmacy Information Technology Group Institutions don't have opinions, merely customs G'day Bruce From the dim, dark recesses of my feeble mind I remember reading somewhere that Apple tried a 4 and 8 pass choice, but 4 passes did not fully erase the drive, hence the only choice of 8 passes for a full, secure erasure when disposing of a drive, and a single pass if you intended to re-use the drive yourself. Might be faster to DD (dismantle and destroy). Regards Santa --~--~-~--~~~---~--~~ You received this message because you are subscribed Low End Mac's G3-5 List, a group for those using G3, G4, and G5 desktop Macs - with a particular focus on Power Macs. The list FAQ is at http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml and our netiquette guide is at http://www.lowendmac.com/lists/netiquette.shtml To post to this group, send email to g3-5-list@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to g3-5-list-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/g3-5-list?hl=en Low End Mac RSS feed at feed://lowendmac.com/feed.xml -~--~~~~--~~--~--~---
