Disposing of XP Netbook

If you have a recycling center, often times they take electronics without charge right along with normal stuff. We've seen all manner of old electronics at our recycling center including dozens of ancient windoze computers.

TomG2 wrote:
I am going to remove the hard drive and render it useless. I will probably have to pay someone to dispose of what's left of the computer. I am disappointed that the Acer restore method did not work for me.

Here's a link to a web page that may be helpful:
http://milescomer.com/tinyempire.com/notes/ntldrismissing.htm

If you have a USB thumbdrive click on the ntldrusb.zip link in Step 2 to download the file. Unzip the file and check the readme.txt for instructions.

If all fails, rather than destroy the drive get an external USB hard drive enclosure. You can then install the drive into that and use it for additional storage.

TomG2 wrote:
I am going to remove the hard drive and render it useless. I will probably have to pay someone to dispose of what's left of the computer. I am disappointed that the Acer restore method did not work for me.

Destroying the HD and rendering a perfectly useful Netbook, without installing a replacement drive, makes little sense? But, unfortunately, many believe in outdated or inaccurate info posted on the NET that doesn't necessarily apply to current PC systems.

All you need to do is to use a free self booting utility that securely wipes the drive. Basically, just deletes exiting files and wipes the free space. Which is what I tried to explain earlier. Or use the secure erase function built into HD/SSD firmware, which is what I do, but not as straight forward a procedure as using a separate freely available software erase utility.

If you're dead set on discarding your Netbook, you can take it to Goodwill for recycling under Dell Reconnect: Donate any brand of computer to Goodwill.

Discarding a netbook with a cracked screen and no operating system makes perfectly good sense to me. If the Acer recovery had worked, I would have kept it for a spare, but I am not going to spend hours and hours trying different software to maintain a device that is not worth more than fifty dollars after five years of service.

TomG2 wrote:
Discarding a netbook with a cracked screen and no operating system makes perfectly good sense to me.

A detail that was left out of your previous posts, or I must have missed it? In which case, I would also just send it off for recycling. And would not have even taken the time to post the other info.

In the future, if concerned about your personnel info by thinking that a factory restore alone with wipe out all your data, is not the case. You should do a secure wipe first. Then do a factory restore.

Even if a factory restore includes a full format, nothing more than a quick format with a surface scan, it does not erase all your personnel data that hasn't been written over.

The "crack" is hardly visible and does not limit using the Netbook. "If" it had a working operating system, it would be worth something to somebody. Thanks to all for their suggestions.