hard drive

After finishing painting a room a couple of weeks ago, I took a good hard look at all the junk I took out of there.  A lot of the stuff needs to be released into the world.

One of the things, is this older computer that my husband used to use. The monitor, one of those giant heavy ones, had already been donated to a local school that collects old electronics to recycle as a fund raiser.

But I was told not to get rid of this part that holds the hard drive...because someone could get information off of it. Maybe like account numbers and passwords.  So there it sat.

Until I opened it to remove and destroy the hard drive.

This was a big deal for me. I have never attempted anything like this.  I watched some videos online first...so I would know which part was the hard drive.  This is it and I got it out!

please excuse the model's paint spattered hand

So, now what do you do with it? You can take it apart further if you have a tiny screwdriver with a star shaped tip. Or you can smash it with a hammer. Or you can drill holes in it, which is what I chose to do.

The idea is to break or permanently damage the "plates" inside. 

Wear eye protection - there will be a lot of metal shavings.

I guess now I will just toss it back into the casing and take it down to the school for recycling.