Hard Drive replacement program

[Evildude683]

Hey guys, about a month ago I received an email letting me know that my iMac was part of that growing number of machines affected by failing Seagate HDD's. I really haven't had any time to make an appointment at my local Apple store but I think I may do it in December.

Has anyone gotten theirs replaced by apple, and if so what did they do with the old hard drive?
Do they erase the data, how to keep all that info from falling into the wrong hands?

Thank you.

 

[SpyderBite]

Back it up. You are getting stock OS X installed on the new HDD unless you want to pay $99 for a data transfer. The old drives are destroyed. I wouldn't worry about privacy issues. It isn't like. Apple Stores tosses your HDD in to the dumpster behind he mall.

 

[Evildude683]

Back it up. You are getting stock OS X installed on the new HDD unless you want to pay $99 for a data transfer. The old drives are destroyed. I wouldn't worry about privacy issues. It isn't like. Apple Stores tosses your HDD in to the dumpster behind he mall.

I have everything backed up using Time Machine.
Can I erase the disk myself before taking the iMac for service?
They won't need to turn the machine on until after the new HDD is installed.

 

[Evildude683]

I went ahead and called my closest Apple store and I was told that they will erase the HDD's contents right before the send them back to Apple.
I told the girl I wasn't confortable with them messing with my computer like that and she suggested to do what they do, just erase the whole HDD using Disk utility.