With some help from WiebeTech's new Drive eRazer

Nov 13, 2007 16:06 GMT  ·  By

It's quite a commonly-known fact that the information stored onto any HDD is not completely lost, even if said device is software-formatted and it might be retrieved after the users dispose of the respective storage solution. However, in order to avoid this undesired situation, the people over at WiebeTech have created the Drive eRazer, a device that allows the users to completely erase the information on any drive, without requiring the presence of a computer.

One of the most important selling points of the Drive eRazer is the fact that it's actually faster than comparable software solutions, writing data at a sustained rate of more than 35MB/s, which means that a 250GB drive would be fully erased in under two hours. Furthermore, the device is fairly simple to use, since all the users have to do is simply connect it to a drive and flip a switch.

The Drive eRazer writes over every bit of a drive. After it's done, there's nothing left to recover. A standard single-pass mode writes one time across the whole disk, deleting blocks including partitions and Host Protected Areas. Verification is also performed.

For those who want even more assurance, several Pro models are also available, these advanced versions being capable of more than one pass with random characters. Thus, they can delete all blocks including partitions and Host Protected Areas, even the ones normally invisible to operating systems. They automatically check for and remove DCOs and write to every sector of the disk using different data each pass. The verification is done after the last pass.

"As many people discover too late, trashing a file does not erase it from a hard drive," said James Wiebe, president/CEO of WiebeTech. "It is fairly easy for someone else to recover files from used hard drives. As a test, we bought used drives on eBay and recovered everything from corporate data to email conversations to financial data to legal documents. Drive eRazer is the easiest, most economical solution available to prevent others from seeing your files."

The device is available in 4 versions: the standard/pro versions for 3.5-inch IDE/PATA drives, priced at around 100/150 US dollars, as well as a pro version for 2.5-inch IDE/PATA drives (also priced at 150 US dollars) and a pro version that works with both 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch SATA or IDE/PATA drives, which retails for around 200 US dollars.

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Photo Gallery (2 Images)

The WiebeTech Drive eRazer connected to a HDD
The Drive eRazer - standalone image
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