[withit]

I am returning my laptop to its place of purchase. I have lots of personal info on it. How do I save them all, then erase so that no one can see?

[tranquility]

Well, if you have CD's you can just go to Windows Explorer and click and drag anything you want to save on to the CD.

You can then right click on the files and delete - then make sure you open the Recycle Icon on the desktop and delete from there too. Or you can do a system restore, instructions should be in the book you got with the computer - you will also need the disks that came with the computer to do the restore.

Tranquility

[Perna]

What kind of personal info? If it's just files you can copy them but if you've "registered" stuff/software with Microsoft, etc. don't know that you can "save" that. When you've copied all the stuff you can/want, I'd reformat the disk but if it comes with software, operating system, etc. don't know that you get rid of that kind of information. You can't make it "new" again if that's what you're wishing for?

[(JD)]

What you are talking about is wiping the hard drive. Yes, you can do this. Do you have the original boot up disk from when you purchased the computer?

Once you have gone into each program and copied the material you want to keep (My Photos, My Documents, Shared Documents) etc... and taken all the programs you have purchased and put onto the hard drive back off... (if you have the disks for them, and they don't carry any data, then don't bother with copying them back)

Reinsert the original boot up disk. FORMAT DRIVE > It will give you a warning that all previous data/programs etc will be erased, is that what you want? > Yes. There ya go!

[MotherSuperior]

There is software available to wipe your hard drive. What you really want to do is traverse three or four rounds of putting random 1's and 0's on every sector of your hard drive. That way, no one will be able to recover anything you had on there, like personal correspondence, passwords, credit card numbers, etc.

There is some software called Paragon Disk Wiper that works on the most recent versions of Windows, except Vista, but I'm betting it would work there too. You can download a free copy at:
http://www.newfreedownloads.com/find/disk-wipe.html.

I highly recommend some sort of disk wipe software because a format of the hard drive (unless you do a low-level format) won't really get rid of everything.

Regards,
MS

if it is text files that you want to save or transfer to a new computer do like i do and email the documents to yourself, that way there is always a electronic copy that you can access anyware, create a file in your inbox for the documents so that they are not deleted by mistake, encript them if you are worried that they might be read,

the best way to erase all the data is to format the hard drive, to do so just insert the operating system software, (your xp disc) and choose install fresh copy option, do not use the quick format option, do the full format option to make sure everything has been cleaned.

oh and before you do erase all your data make sure you have the passwords to your email accounts, web sites that require you to sign in ect