Secure Erase Selection Dialog.
Secure Erase by Parted Magic works with both SSD (Solid State Drives) and HDD (Hard Disk Drives). Important Secure Erase information can be discovered by hovering your mouse over the second column so information could be displayed about your device. Modern computers will “freeze” the disk at boot. Press the sleep button to overcome this. The computer could be placed into a sleep mode to unfreeze them. Pressing any key or the power button could wake it up. The third column will then be labeled “Not Frozen”. The “Frozen” label is normal when first starting this program. The fourth column displays the temporary security password. This does not do what you may think. It is best to leave it “password” unless you know what you are doing. Do not ever change it to “NULL” or empty (blank). The fourth column toggles between “Secure” and “Enhanced”. “Secure” marks each cell as empty. “Enhanced” generates a new public encryption key so the data could be undecipherable. You can see if your drive supports “enhanced erase” by hovering your mouse over the second column. The “beep” check box makes the computer beep when the erase completed.
Secure Erase Confirmation Dialog.
This dialog displays the choices from the first dialog. You can still make changes at this time by pressing the “Back” button. Tick the check box “I allow this utility to erase the listed devices.” to continue. This makes it difficult to erase the wrong drive. Press the “Start Erase” button when ready. Once the erase has started, it cannot be stopped. Prevent any chance of power failure. The drive may become “bricked” if the power is shut off.
Secure Erase Progress Dialog.
Parted Magic displays the time remaining when possible. Very old disks cannot display this information. “Unknown time remaining” could be displayed instead. Some disks can take hours to erase. Do not shut off the power or reboot the computer. You may still access the “Help” menu from this dialog.
Secure Erase Results Dialog.
When the erase process has been completed, this dialog displays success or failure. The location of the log file is displayed near the bottom. Use the Mount Devices program located in the panel to save this file to a disk. Parted Magic runs from RAM. The log file will disappear when the computer reboots.
Expanded Results Dialog.
The Results dialog could be expanded to offer more compression options. One or more may be selected. Then select the location where the log file could be saved.
Documentation.
Features of this program could be explained in the built-in documentation. This information could be accessed from any dialog.
Disable Security.
Easily disable security if a failed erase or power outage occurs.
Health Inspection.
Check the health of supported disks.
Alternate Sleep Method.
If the “Sleep” button doesn’t work, Parted Magic provides a built in workaround. Disks must be “Not Frozen” before an erase is possible.
Executing the Alternate Sleep Method.
Freeze drives if needed or desired.
