Hard drive wiping checklist

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Macintosh Hard drive Wiping procedure

Mac hard drives are wiped while still inside the system. This is because Macs take forever to disassemble. Currently Mac hard drives are wiped using the tools available during the network installation. Details are contained in the MacBuild checklists. If you should need to wipe a hard drive using a CD rather than the network you can use the instructions detailed below.

Please follow the steps below to wipe a hard drive. If you come across problems, such as the system won't boot from CD, you can refer to MacBuild Tips 'n Tricks for troubleshooting.

Steps	Notes/Detailed Instructions	Done
Connect keyboard, mouse, and network cable to the computer
Boot from network	Hold down the "n" key while turning the computer on. Release the key when you see the flashing globe on the screen. At the first stage bootloader, press the "l" key to boot into Linux. Press enter at the second stage bootloader to start the process.
Go through the prompts given and chose the appropriate options	The options you should select are English, United States, NO, USA, and USA.
Execute shell	Once the system asks you to confirm the hard driving partitioning scheme, use the tab key to "go back" two screens to a menu of options. Use the arrow key to highlight "Execute shell" and press enter.
Run badblocks	At the prompt type "badblocks -wvvf -c1024 -e1 /dev/hda" and hit enter. If that command fails, try "badblocks -wvvf -c1024 -e1 /dev/sda" instead.

Wiping HDDs from the network: PPC desktops and laptops

If it isn't easy to replace the hard drive with one that is wiped we'll need to wipe the hard drive that is in the computer. This specifically applies to all Mac laptops and iMacG5s with iSight:

• Boot to the network by starting the computer and holding down the N key.
• At the first boot prompt choose w (ltsp disk wiper).
• When the computer stops at a log-in prompt, change to alternate terminal 7 by selecting the control+alt+F7 keys simultaneously. You may need to hold the FN key on laptops as well.
• When you get the tty7 prompt, type disktest and select return. This should start the S.M.A.R.T. test.
• Wait for confirmation of the HDD, then press enter.
• If the drive passes the S.M.A.R.T. test it will automatically start the badblocks test which will wipe the disk. If it fails the S.M.A.R.T test it will tell you to recycle the drive.

The badblocks test usually takes 4 or more hours to run.