We're a government contractor, and have a bunch of iPaq, Toshiba pocketPC
units we're no longer using.. We use Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) on
desktop/laptop harddrives prior to excessing, and I wonder if there is
something similar for WindowsMobile systems.. A googling of "PPC secure wipe"
gives me a few links to forums where the suggestion is to do a hard reset,
but AFAIK, the data is still there, and nothing else apparent for PPCs... The
boss wants me to get a big drill and bore some holes in them, which obviously
would work, but I'm loathe to do that without getting some expert opinion on
a better fix for securely wiping these otherwise perfectly usable pdas before
we excess them....

LVDave

Hello, Dave ! Is your company, by any chance, planning on selling these
units, after you finish decomissioning them ? I'm a freelance developer and
I've got a consultance project and I need some (cheap and not very fancy)
PDA's for some testing. It'd be wonderful if I could get some of them !

Thanks for a reply and sorry for not being able to provide an answer to your
original question.

Ionut

"LVDave" <LVDave@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:EE620E7D-4707-4DE8-9C0B-397BC3E3FCB6@microsoft.com...
> We're a government contractor, and have a bunch of iPaq, Toshiba pocketPC
> units we're no longer using.. We use Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) on
> desktop/laptop harddrives prior to excessing, and I wonder if there is
> something similar for WindowsMobile systems.. A googling of "PPC secure
> wipe"
> gives me a few links to forums where the suggestion is to do a hard reset,
> but AFAIK, the data is still there, and nothing else apparent for PPCs...
> The
> boss wants me to get a big drill and bore some holes in them, which
> obviously
> would work, but I'm loathe to do that without getting some expert opinion
> on
> a better fix for securely wiping these otherwise perfectly usable pdas
> before
> we excess them....
>
> LVDave

Well as I said, we are a gov contractor, and the units are gov property. We
process the units paperwork-wise, send the paperwork to the gov agency we
work for, and they arrange for, what I believe to be, Liquidation Services,
to come by and pick up.. We currently have a flock of old Dell GX270 systems
that should be picked up today.. Sorry..

LVDave

"Ionut" wrote:

> Hello, Dave ! Is your company, by any chance, planning on selling these
> units, after you finish decomissioning them ? I'm a freelance developer and
> I've got a consultance project and I need some (cheap and not very fancy)
> PDA's for some testing. It'd be wonderful if I could get some of them !
>
> Thanks for a reply and sorry for not being able to provide an answer to your
> original question.
>
> Ionut
>
> "LVDave" <LVDave@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:EE620E7D-4707-4DE8-9C0B-397BC3E3FCB6@microsoft.com...
> > We're a government contractor, and have a bunch of iPaq, Toshiba pocketPC
> > units we're no longer using.. We use Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) on
> > desktop/laptop harddrives prior to excessing, and I wonder if there is
> > something similar for WindowsMobile systems.. A googling of "PPC secure
> > wipe"
> > gives me a few links to forums where the suggestion is to do a hard reset,
> > but AFAIK, the data is still there, and nothing else apparent for PPCs...
> > The
> > boss wants me to get a big drill and bore some holes in them, which
> > obviously
> > would work, but I'm loathe to do that without getting some expert opinion
> > on
> > a better fix for securely wiping these otherwise perfectly usable pdas
> > before
> > we excess them....
> >
> > LVDave
>
>

There may be some sort of official procedure that covers this if it's
government related.. If the devices have removable storage memory, take out
those cards and you can run a compatible hard disk wipe tool on them whilst
they're hooked up to a PC via a card reader. I got a freebie (for home use)
app from HDDGuru.com to do this with my memory card prior to partitioning
and formatting it. As far as the actual device memory, the only thing I can
think of is (re)flashing the latest ROM onto them. I know when I've updated
the ROM on my TyTN II, part of that procedure involves clearing storage
memory and as data is effectively written to the device from the PC doing
the updating, more overwriting occurs than if you just do a hard reset. It
also means the devices will be up to date and therefore more saleable/able
to get a higher price when disposed of. Actually the big drill idea may not
be so secure because unless the drill goes throuigh the memory chips that
store data, technically the data is still there and a really determined
person with the right equipment could remove those chips from the PCB and
transfer data from them.

Paul

"LVDave" <LVDave@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:EE620E7D-4707-4DE8-9C0B-397BC3E3FCB6@microsoft.com...
> We're a government contractor, and have a bunch of iPaq, Toshiba pocketPC
> units we're no longer using.. We use Darik's Boot and Nuke (DBAN) on
> desktop/laptop harddrives prior to excessing, and I wonder if there is
> something similar for WindowsMobile systems.. A googling of "PPC secure
> wipe"
> gives me a few links to forums where the suggestion is to do a hard reset,
> but AFAIK, the data is still there, and nothing else apparent for PPCs...
> The
> boss wants me to get a big drill and bore some holes in them, which
> obviously
> would work, but I'm loathe to do that without getting some expert opinion
> on
> a better fix for securely wiping these otherwise perfectly usable pdas
> before
> we excess them....
>
> LVDave

The issue with main memory, since it became "persistant" with wm5, is
that it is conceivable that the chips could be physically removed and
the data extracted manually.

The best option be to write a small program which would incrementally
write all <spaces> or other character and force writes after each
character to a single file placed in main memory after all other files
have been erased and the pim database emptied... oh, don't forget the
registry ;-)

Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]

"Beverly Howard [Ms-MVP/MobileDev]" wrote:

> The issue with main memory, since it became "persistant" with wm5, is
> that it is conceivable that the chips could be physically removed and
> the data extracted manually.
>
> The best option be to write a small program which would incrementally
> write all <spaces> or other character and force writes after each
> character to a single file placed in main memory after all other files
> have been erased and the pim database emptied... oh, don't forget the
> registry ;-)
>
> Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]
>

The units in question are all WM2003 units, mostly HP Ipaqs, a Toshiba
GenieoE, and an old Palm3C. Thanks for the idea, but we don't have any
PPC-programmers here, nor the tools needed to write such a program.
Since all of our excessed harddrives are both DBAN-wiped AND then
shredded (don't ask me why we do both...).. I agree on the problem with
drilling, where unless you take the unit apart and drill ALL of the LSI chips
seen, you may miss one, and somebody somewhere who gets ahold of the unit can
possibly recover data from the flash ram. We may have to end up shredding
them as well to be sure they're not recoverable.. Seems a waste.. Sounds
like WM2006 is gonna be even worse for end-of-life data removal....

Thanks again to both posters!!

LVDave

>> The units in question are all WM2003 units, <<

Should have mentioned that ;-)

Remove the batteries and leave long enough for the internal batt or
capacity to go dead and, since main memory is ram, all ram data is gone...

obviously, data on memory card, "safe store" or the pim data backup are
persistant.

Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]

ooh soory.. forgot that it matters..
Thanks for the info!!

LVdave

"Beverly Howard [Ms-MVP/MobileDev]" wrote:

> >> The units in question are all WM2003 units, <<
>
> Should have mentioned that ;-)
>
> Remove the batteries and leave long enough for the internal batt or
> capacity to go dead and, since main memory is ram, all ram data is gone...
>
> obviously, data on memory card, "safe store" or the pim data backup are
> persistant.
>
> Beverly Howard [MS MVP-Mobile Devices]
>