Computer help forum: Using Dban for the first time

I'll remember that CMRR app for future use. I was able to use dban on a laptop (running windows xp) with the drives attached via usb with an external enclosure. Seemed to work and the old win 98 system was taken to Best buy for recycling.

I am about to dban another drive that I formatted years ago. It should be empty with no files but if I right click and select properties it says something like 66 mb is used. What is this from and should I be concerned? I don't see any files but then why is space being used?

A file system, even when empty will use quite a few bytes.

Yes, I've read some stories about people doing that and freaking out afterwards. Definitely will be more cautious than that.

I just burned the disc (cd-r using cdburnerxp). After I put the disc in and turn on the computer it tries to read the disc but then seems to give up and then tries to read floppy and then hard drive. Then Windows boots up. I also tried it using a cd-rw and infrarecorder. The same thing happens. I put the cd-r back into my laptop and it sees the files in windows explorer. I don't think it is the cd drive because I used it earlier to load puppy linux. Is the machine just too old to work?

It won't do a thing. Creating a bootable CD takes a different click of the buttons but lets' share the CDBURNERXP Tutorial on using an .ISO file. Link follows.

http://cdburnerxp.se/help/data/burn-iso

is that I don't know what burn method to use. The tutorial says to use disc at once but it's different in the latest version of cdburnerxp. Do I use disc at once p-w dao96 or p+q pao16. I have been running it on "choose automatically". Maybe thats my problem. Any idea on which one to use?

I also tried to use killdisk. I don't know as much about it but I tried to burn it and after booting it the only thing on the screen is FreeDOS.

There are old machines that can't boot from CD anymore. Things to try?

1. Burn at 2X speed.
2. Use your CD/DVD lens cleaner.
3. Use the USB memory stick boot methods.
4. Go get ISOBURNER. It knows how to deal with ISO files and there is no need to check any box or change any setting except if the machine is old and we need to try the 2X record speed.

Looks like my original Cd-r did work! I decided to put it in my laptop just to see if it would boot and it did. For some reason the old desktop just didn't want to read these discs. I even swapped out the cd drive to a newer one and it still didn't do anything. Why it would read puppy and ubuntu linux and not dban and killdisk, I have no idea. Guess I will put these old drives into an external enclosure and then use dban on the old laptop (that I am also recycling). Thanks for all of the input Bob.

Too bad I can't find what PC this is. I have tricks such as unplugging USB things, disable things in the BIOS and more but I don't have the make, model to work with.
Bob

a Compaq Presario 5000A with windows 98se. Its over 11 years old!

Puppy is very light on RAM. DBAN might have a big memory requirement or not handle an old machine like that.

-> When I hit an old machine like that I find myself jumping in the BIOS to disable onboard sound, ethernet and sometimes USB.
Bob

There is an option to disable PCI bus mastering. The only thing you can change with onboard sound and usb is the Irq number. Not really sure what any of this is. I installed more ram a long time ago. Under system information it says there is 256mb.

Puppy Linux is one of the sub 1GB RAM versions.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1122068/dban-failed-need-an-alternative-program-to-wipe-my-data mentions others.

The lack of RAM and the old IRQ machine is a fine clue that running today's OSes will be challenging.
Bob