HP PCs - Using HP Disk Sanitizer or Secure Erase

This document is for HP PCs.

HP Disk Sanitizer and Secure Erase are tools used to permanently remove data from a hard disk or solid-state drive. The deleted information cannot be recovered.

• HP Disk Sanitizer: Works only on hard drives. It permanently deletes data from the hard drive and is not available for solid-state drives.
• Secure Erase: Works on solid-state drives and hard disk drives. HP added Secure Erase to the standard BIOS in 2011. Systems sold in 2009 or later can upgrade the BIOS to include Secure Erase.

Use these tools when:

• UEFI cannot find an error on the disk after it displays an error during operating system installation.
• You want to permanently remove or delete all data from your hard disk or solid-state drive.

  caution:

Before beginning, backup your local data. The deleted information cannot be recovered.

Use one of these tools depending on the age of your computer and whether you have a hard drive or solid-state drive.

Current PCs: On computers purchased in 2011 or later, access HP Disk Sanitizer or Secure Erase through the BIOS using the following steps:

1. Turn on or restart the computer.
2. While the display is blank, press the F10 key repeatedly to enter the BIOS settings menu. The BIOS settings menu is accessible by pressing the F2 or the F6 key on some computers.
3. Select Security.
4. Select Hard Drive Utilities or Hard Drive Tools.
5. Select Secure Erase or Disk Sanitizer to open the tool.

note:

For products sold from 2009-2011, you might need to install the tool by updating the BIOS. See HP Notebook PCs - Updating the BIOS or HP Desktop PCs - Updating the BIOS for instructions.

Older PCs: For older PCs sold before 2009 that do not have this tool, download the softpaq sp40109 and create a CD or USB boot. When executing sp40109.exe, a folder will be created in C:\SWSetup\sp40109.

You can record a Disksan.iso on a CD or create a pen drive Boot and copy the files from the folder to the pen drive and execute in the boot the Disksan.exe command.