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How do I delete my cache and History bits from my (Microsoft Aptiva) computer with Windows 98?
And can pics :):) be saved to zip drive floppys and thus deleted from hard drive, saving memory space?
And if I buy a new computer, can everything I have on my old one be transferred to the new one (like my email history, etc.)?
And when I decide to get rid of this old computer and get the new one, can everything on this one be completely and totally wiped?
Grateful thanks from a Geezer...!
"Always forgive your enemies...nothing annoys them quite so much." Oscar Wilde
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Yes David the Pics CAN be saved but if you have a LOT of them, when you get a NEW computer, you can transfer them over to your NEW HDD and then get rid of the stuff on the OLD one. Much easier than HEAPS of Floppies.
If you feel you MUST get rid of the History and such NOW, if you have IE you should have an ICON on the desktop of Internet explorer. Right click on it and select properties from the menu.
There should now be a nested menu and the General one is the first. There is a setting in the Temporary Internet Files and it is for Deleting the stored pages. Click it and flsuh the Cache, then, select clear history and delete the stored hsitory. A good start But I would Definately think about using the OLD HDD to transfer the stuff you want over to the NEW HDD. If there is sensitive material on there, I am sure there are "gay" type Computer people out there hehe
Ashley
People have a habit of changing your direction through life
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tim
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Really getting into it |
Location: UK, West of London in Ber...
Registered: February 2002
Messages: 842
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Install PGP Disk, whihc has the facility for wiping totally ALL deleted areas on your disk. http://web.mit.edu/network/pgp.html helps US users. International users need to search for a site for it.
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Like Ashley said, cache can be emptied from the Internet properties window. The history is easily cleared on the same tab, just below the cache options.
It's certainly faster to move a lot of pics from one harddrive to the next by connecting up the old harddrive to the new computer, but it's more fiddly and requires a bit of computer-geek skillz. A geezer could do it I'm sure, but zips are easier for sure (and it would have to be a LOT of pics to make zips feel constrained... ).
Transfer of emails is more complicated, since particulary Microsoft programs like to hide away such things in places where it's bothersome to locate them. It will probably be something like this for example: "C:\WINDOWS\Application Data\Identities\{79B22974-3EA1-4FB5-A120-6C76D23862EA}\Microsoft\Outlook Express\". Not the easiest thing to remember...
You could try the archive menu in your email program and use the Export function usually found there. Choose a destination you're sure to remember. Copy the resulting file to a zip disk (assuming it will fit), and then Import it onto your new computer. Or skip the zip if you decide to move the harddrive. It's up to you.
Internet bookmarks are found in your windows\favorites folder. Just copy all the files there over to your new computer and you'll have access to all your regular visiting places.
Finally, to get everything totally completely wiped, you need to destroy your harddrive with a hammer or something like that. However, for most situations a simple format from a DOS prompt will suffice (not a DOS box while running windows; you need to start from a MSDOS boot disk and do it from there, or else only certain parts of the disk will be wiped).
Even several formats will still allow a determined person to extract data from the harddrive, but it costs hundreds, if not thousands of $$ to do so and why would anyone bother to try and find out what you had on your old computer? That's being a bit too paranoid don't you think...? 
Anyway, there are professional disk wiping programs out there that writes multiple generations of random data to the drive to completely hide anything previously stored on it. If run enough times, not even the most zealous evil government agent will find anything on such a prepared harddrive. A free program which will do this is included in the PGP encryption package. I still think it's overkill though.
If there's anything else, just ask, OK?
-Lenny
"But he that hath the steerage of my course,
direct my sail."
-William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act One, Scene IV
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tim
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Really getting into it |
Location: UK, West of London in Ber...
Registered: February 2002
Messages: 842
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People have a habit of looking at deleted files. Coloconel (I think) Oliver North found this to his cost in the late 1980s. Or was it the early 1990s
When you delete a file you JUST delete the pointer to it. The data remains.
If you have anything you would prefer no-one else to see, wipe it
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But good 'ol Ollie never did anything wrong, both him and the courts said so!
Anyway, Joe Schmoe wouldn't have the faintest clue how to get access to any deleted files, and if the harddrive's been through a full DOS format there won't be any data left; it's all been cleared. Only by repeatedly deep-scanning the platters at a data recovery firm can data from formatted harddrives be extracted and since the cost of doing that is many MANY times higher than simply buying a new harddrive, nobody's going to put a 2nd hand harddrive through such a procedure just to see if there's anything interesting left on it.
Btw, I'm buying myself a new harddrive. 120 speedy gigs heading my way by the end of next week, yum!
-Lenny
"But he that hath the steerage of my course,
direct my sail."
-William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act One, Scene IV
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