The fastest disk wiper

[shahwill]

which app can i use to wipe a harddrive the fastest way?

 

[Branden]

any app that truly wipes a hdd will not be fast. it takes time to randomly write data to every bit on a hdd, it's speed is dependant on the hdd and how many passes you're doing.

ie. a single 1tb hdd is going to take up to 2 hours per pass, to truly wipe it's data you're going to want to do 5 to 7 passes. that's going to be several hours.

beware any program that claims to be able to wipe data significantly faster than that.

edit: unless you want to wipe a ssd, wiping those is much faster because they're typically smaller, faster, and only need 1-2 passes.

 

[WyomingKnott]

The fastest way to wipe a modern SATA hard drive is to issue the Secure Erase command to it. It will then wipe itself. The National Institute of Standards and Technology endorses this as the most secure form of wipe short of physical destruction of the drive. http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistpubs/800-88/NISTSP800-88_rev1.pdf

I personally use the bootable PartedMagic distro for the Secure Erase command. It's in the Erase Disk (or some such) submenu. Be sure to select the self-erase or secure erase option.