Triple check you are choosing the correct drive. Next, find the drive you want to erase among the list and note the letter and numeral values to the left of the said drive (for example, “PO”).Hit “Y” one more time when warned about powering the PC through an outlet rather than a battery.When prompted to proceed, hit “Y” then enter.

Type “hdderase” in the DOS command prompt and press enter.

Restart the computer and change the priority boot order in the system BIOS to load up the USB drive.

Copy the HDD Erase executable to the USB drive.Create a USB DOS bootable drive using a utility such as Rufus.On the flip side, HDD Erase only runs in DOS and isn’t as user-friendly as the other methods in our guide. The main advantages of HDD Erase are that it is 100% free and works will all SSD hard drives regardless of the manufacturer. The second most widely used technique is employing an unassuming program by the name of HDD Erase, which was, at a time, the recipient of the NSA’s blessing as the number one technique for securely erasing drives. As always, remember that the process completely wipes the drive, including Windows 10. In most cases, you’ll need to create a bootable USB drive to allow the utility to work. Follow the instructions to trigger the Secure Erase utility.Open Samsung Magician and click on “Secure Erase” in the menu that runs along the bottom of the program window.Double click on the executable and follow the installation wizard.

Download the utility here from the Samsung website.

Some examples of secure erase utilities include Samsung Magician, Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox, and Kingston SSD Toolbox.įor reference, let’s take Samsung Magician: In many cases, a toolkit comes loaded onto the SSD itself. Data recovery programs will be unable to retrieve data afterward.Įach toolkit works differently, and as such, we recommend searching on the web site of your hard drive manufacturer for not only the utility itself but also how to complete an erase. Secure Erase completely flushes an SSD of any data by returning it to its factory settings, or out of the box functionality. Secure Erase is widely considered the most effective way to erase an SSD drive. Most, if not all, SSD manufacturers provide what is called a toolbox, or utility, with a variety of SSD specific tools, including a Secure Erase function.

Wipe ssd