Selling MBP [hard drive formatting question]

[petrucci666]

I bought the new 13" MBP and I'm selling my Late 2007 15" MBP to cover the cost. I will be formatting the hard drive so that my account and info on the computer are erased. My question is, how can I erase my account on the system so that whenever the new owner gets it, he/she gets the Leopard start up screen (The one like when you purchase a new Mac and you have to setup your account i.e. the "welcome" screen)?

Sorry if I'm not being clear but I hope you get what I'm aiming for

Thanks!

 

[kryptonianjorel]

Pop the disk in, erase and install.

I'm not positive, but you can probably install it to a point, and when it restarts to complete the installation, turn the computer off. I've never done this before on a mac (only PCs) so thats how i'd assume it works.

Or have them install the OS themselves

 

[tenderidol]

For extra security -if needed- you may want to wipe the drive first before formatting and installing OS X. You never know.....

 

[petrucci666]

For extra security -if needed- you may want to wipe the drive first before formatting and installing OS X. You never know.....

What do you mean by "wipe"? Like erasing it in Disk Utility?

 

[MasterDev]

If you're super paranoid like me, do a 35 pass erase...

 

[polaris20]

What do you mean by "wipe"? Like erasing it in Disk Utility?

Boot off of the OS install disk, and go into Disk Utility. Highlight the system drive, and go to the erase portion. On that page is a button called security options. Choose the 7-pass method, in which it zeros out the drive to DOD standards. Then worry about installing the OS.

EDIT

MasterDev beat me to it.

 

[kryptonianjorel]

If you're super paranoid like me, do a 35 pass erase...

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Dude, thats overkill. You can be paranoid all you want, but government equipment cannot detect past data after the 7th pass.

There's no need to do more than 1 pass unless you've got something to hide from uncle sam, because if the person scanning your hard drive's weakened magnetic levels of past data has the equipment to do it, he/she certainly doesn't need your bank account numbers...

 

[kryptonianjorel]

7 pass is for uncle sam, 35 pass is for CSIS

I don't care, 35 pass works for me, everyone can do whatever they want. But the most efficient way is 35 pass.

Most secure, def not most efficient.

Out of curiosity, how long does a 35 pass take on your 80 GB HD?

 

[tenderidol]

If you are in a hurry, 3 pass DOD would do fine. For a 500GB drive I recently did, it took about 12 hours. If you want something more secure, DOD 7 works, but for the same drive it took about 30 hours. If your drive supports it, the more secure and a lot quicker method is to use the HDDerase. http://cmrr.ucsd.edu/people/Hughes/SecureErase.shtml