Wipe securely feature for drives

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Toad
Posts: 8
Joined: 11 Dec 2008 19:23

Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Toad »

I love the wipe securely feature for files, but I'd also like to see this feature for entire drives or partitions. Thanks!
Maël
Site Admin
Posts: 1455
Joined: 12 Mar 2005 14:15

Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Maël »

Noted, on TODO-list.
Toad
Posts: 8
Joined: 11 Dec 2008 19:23

Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Toad »

Thanks! Can't wait!
Maël
Site Admin
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Joined: 12 Mar 2005 14:15

Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Maël »

This is also possible using the command "Edit|Fill selection". What is currently missing is the ability to handle drives larger than free RAM since the changes are stored there and only written on execution of the save command. Additionally these changes should be applied directly to the disk to be effective (else several writes will be written only as one, effectively reducing it to one pass).

See also http://forum.mh-nexus.de/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=263
Deleter

Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Deleter »

This is missing. I see the possibility to select many passes but are they really done in RAM only? Strange. The solutions provided in this and other thread are not useful for wiping a 90GiB disk with 96 MiB RAM. Related problems:

Physical disk list includes USB sticks sometimes only (still, HxD is the only one running in Win98 at all)

Written changes to USB are lost in some cases (must unplug and reinsert to prevent?)
Maël
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Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Maël »

Deleter wrote:This is missing. I see the possibility to select many passes but are they really done in RAM only? Strange.
Not that strange, since there is no feature to wipe disks, only to fill the current selection. Editing works in RAM only until you save, that's what you usually expect. That's why there is a separate file shredder to wipe files. My answer above is more to point out (mostly to me) what needs to be changed to make a disk wiping feature.
Deleter wrote:The solutions provided in this and other thread are not useful for wiping a 90GiB disk with 96 MiB RAM.
Please elaborate.
Deleter wrote:Physical disk list includes USB sticks sometimes only (still, HxD is the only one running in Win98 at all)
This is too vague for me to do anything about it.
Deleter wrote:Written changes to USB are lost in some cases (must unplug and reinsert to prevent?)
Again, please be more specific if you want something to be fixed. What OS, what did you do when it happened, step by step description. Thanks.
Deleter

Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Deleter »

Very fast answer :D
Maël wrote:Please elaborate.
I can wipe only in RAM and then save the changes. If disk is much bigger than RAM then this is too painful.
Maël wrote:This is too vague for me to do anything about it.
Sometimes I see the USB stick in the physical disk list and can open and edit it a bit, and sometimes not, it is still always in the disk letter list, no full disk with MBR then.
Maël wrote:more specific if you want something to be fixed. What OS, what did you do when it happened, step by step
Win98, open USB stick as physical, rename some files, save the changes ignoring all warnings, check the result with some file manager, do some writes with the file manager, changes done with HxD are reverted. Or unplug the stick just after writing, replug in, changes are there.
Maël
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Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Maël »

Deleter wrote:I can wipe only in RAM and then save the changes. If disk is much bigger than RAM then this is too painful.
Measures will be taken such that the amount of RAM needed will be minimal, for example by directly applying the changes to the disk.
Deleter wrote:Sometimes I see the USB stick in the physical disk list and can open and edit it a bit, and sometimes not, it is still always in the disk letter list, no full disk with MBR then.
Is this maybe after you have edited the disk? So you say the disk is visible in the logical disk list but not the physical disk list?
Maël wrote:Win98, open USB stick as physical, rename some files
Rename files in HxD by editing the disk or using another app like Explorer? If in HxD, then this is normal. You are editing the file system "behind the back" of Windows, and Windows isn't aware of the changes until you somehow force it to update its information (for example by unplugging and replugging the stick).
Maël wrote:save the changes ignoring all warnings, check the result with some file manager, do some writes with the file manager, changes done with HxD are reverted.
If the changes in the writes done in file manager are on the same drive as the one modified in HxD, then this is normal too. The file manager is not aware of changes you make if they are not done by the file system, so it may have cached some information and when you change something writes back more than what you just changed. A disk editor bypasses the file system and the operating system is not aware of that.
Deleter

Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Deleter »

Maël wrote:Measures will be taken such that the amount of RAM needed will be minimal, for example by directly applying the changes to the disk.
Excellent :)
Maël wrote:Is this maybe after you have edited the disk? So you say the disk is visible in the logical disk list but not the physical disk list?
No, just after plugging in. Yes, only as logical letter.
Maël wrote:You are editing the file system "behind the back" of Windows, and Windows isn't aware of the changes until you somehow force
Isnt there some lock/reload/uncache trick?

Thanks for this great freeware btw.
Maël
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Joined: 12 Mar 2005 14:15

Re: Wipe securely feature for drives

Post by Maël »

Deleter wrote:
Maël wrote:Is this maybe after you have edited the disk? So you say the disk is visible in the logical disk list but not the physical disk list?
No, just after plugging in. Yes, only as logical letter.
Hmm. Did you plug it in before opening the disk-dialog and waited a little?
Deleter wrote:
Maël wrote:You are editing the file system "behind the back" of Windows, and Windows isn't aware of the changes until you somehow force
Isnt there some lock/reload/uncache trick?
For Vista I'm going to implement locking/unlocking because it's required to write to certain portions of a disk. This will also work on at least Windows 2000 and XP.
Windows 9x on the other hand requires a completely different approach using the BIOS, interrupts etc. I also would have to look if there is a way to inform the OS that something has changed. I'm not sure I'm going to do that (for Win9x) as it will require major time investment and only about 0,5% of HxD's users still use Win9x.
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