Selling my mac. What steps should i take to remove all personal info/files

[soizsai]

Hey guys,

Im selling my powermac g5 to someone and I need to erase all my personal files and data. I would just format everything but the buyer wants to keep all my software and music.

Is there like a checklist of things i should do before i give my computer away.
So far Ive deleted all my personal files and erased my internet cache and files. Should i use a third party software to 'shred' my files before i delete it in the os. sorry if i sound paranoid hehe

 

[Natobasso]

Buyer can't "legally" keep your software and music, so keep that in mind...

I am selling my iMac and in order to be sure it's wiped I reformatted the hard drive (I had two partitions and created just one partition) and then wiped and installed OS X (came with 10.2 so the person buying my comp can upgrade).

 

[ecirtap]

Data can still be recovered even after you have formatted a harddrive.

To make sure it cannot be recovered, you would have to format it using one of the options in Disk Utility: "zero all data" or "8 way random write format". (Both can take ages to complete.)

patrice
http://www.patriceschneider.com/apple-osx/blog/

 

[Natobasso]

I wiped and reformatted the hard drive as well as wiping and reinstalling os x.

 

[Qion]

The easiest way to do this would be to 1. Create another administrating user account 2. Log into it 3. Destroy your old Admin account.

This should get rid of your personal stuff completely... unless you had a public folder or stored crap in the main apps folder or something. You're not going to be able to retain your apps if you just do a zero and reinstall... unless all your programs are legal, and you still have the install discs. If that's the case, zero your hard drive, put your itunes library on some external media, and tell your buyer to install the programs himself.