Thinkpads Forum

Hello Folks, I have a T520 i7, how do I completely erase hard drive (SSD), including all partitions. I got hacked by a relative that had access to the PC. Thanks

Use the ATA secure erase function in linux: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/SS ... l_clearing. You can burn a linux distro, such as Arch linux, to a usb stick and boot off of it to access the commands. In my experience, the actual erase usually takes less than a minute.

Thanks man. Is there anyway to do it from windows or I do have the system disks?

Burning a Linux disk?
You can download any distro you want and then use something like Pendrive Linux (http://www.pendrivelinux.com/) to load it onto a flash drive. To burn to a disk, you have to use a disk burner program.

Also, some relative you have.

I am trying to completely re-format a SSD using windows.

frankparisi wrote:Is there anyway to do it from windows or I do have the system disks?

I don't think you can erase the OS while using. You can use the recovery discs to re-install the OS, which should block access for you relative. You shouldn't need to wipe the drive.

I had problems with the system disks. On a T43P for instance I reinstalled them twice, and ended up with three restore partitions. The orignal and two new ones. This drive is only 160 gb. So my goal is to wipe it completely clean, and then use the system disks. ( I like some of the Lenovo bloatware)

1. I am not technical anymore but it seems to me, that I could load something in the RAM, and FDISK it. 2. Or maybe the drive manufacturer
has something.

By the way, that T43P was my favorite machine of my Txxx's!

[Edit:]
Sorry, just noticed in your *original* question you asked about T520...

I believe that for Lenovo Thinkpad T520 you can just stick your System Recovery Disks, boot from it, and it will first wipe clean your SSD partitions, then proceed to restore your system from scratch.

Just a few days ago, I did the same for my T410 Thinkpad, and no extra (unwanted) partition problems on my SSD!

(For the record, I upgraded T410 Win7>>Win10, but Win10 was trick and refused to let me downgrade back to Win7 again.
So I had to resort to use T410 System Recovery Disks, and no extra (unwanted) partition problems!)

========= Original Posting as below=========
Hey frankparisi,

I do not own my T42 anymore, but from what I recall, the T42 and T43 era IBM Thinkpad Recovery Disks may have a bug:
ie: The System Recovery Disks *DOES*NOT* wipe the existing partitions from your SSD before proceeding with System Recovery.
Actually the IBM System Recovery Disks attempts to *ADD* new partitions, without first wiping the SSD clean.

Hence you got more and more disk partitions each successive time you tried to use the IBM System Recovery Disks.

1. If you have an external USB hard drive enclosure and another computer, you can consider to use this free program to erase your notebook SSD of all existing partitions:
http://www.disk-partition.com/free-part ... nager.html

[Disclaimer: I am a fellow Thinkpad user, and have nothing to do with this company!]

2. Then you can use your IBM System Recovery Disks as usual.

3. Back in my T42 IBM Thinkpad days, IBM Thinkpad Technical Support actually gave me a Non-Thinkpad utility: Partition Eraser CD that you must boot up from to zap (delete) all partitions from your SSD, and after which you may start to use your IBM System Recovery Disks.

Good luck!

Thanks for all of your advice. I recall back when I had my T43, I found a utility from Hitachi that let me wipe the drive. Then I installed from the IBM System disks thus eliminating the extra partitions.

Based on advice from this board, I purchased a new Sandisk Extreme Pro SSD for my w530 i7 3920XM. I can't wait.

Here's a description, plus a collection if some tools to erase an SSD: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/securely-e ... estroying/

What makes you think the machine was hacked? How technically saavy is the crook?
I ask because you're wrongly assuming that clearing the HDD will reset your computer to it's pre-hacked state.

Anyway, for the hard drive I'd second the notion of using Linux in favor of Windows. My experience has been that windows disk utilities lack power, even for simple operations it's like using a fly swatter to kill an aligator.

Here is a simple Linux tool. No command line needed.
http://gparted.org/livecd.php

Once it's started simply do:
Device > Create Partition Table

While this isn't as heavy handed as some of the other suggestions, it is VERY unlikely any code put onto the drive would survive and be functional.

All modern SSD encrypts data by default so the "erase" operation is just to rewrite the key

https://jbeekman.nl/blog/2015/03/lenovo ... -password/
Modern SSDs (at least the ones made by Intel, Samsung) always encrypt all stored data using AES. The encryption key used is stored in nonvolatile memory on the SSD. One of the reasons for this is that to securely wipe the drive now you just need to overwrite the encryption key with a new random one. This way, you don’t need to erase every flash block, which is very bad for durability reasons.