loveranger

If you think Eraser stinks, then you shouldn't even try CCleaner. I'm sure you never used it correctly. 1-pass (Pse), cluster tips enabled, run as administrator - it should do the job. It will take awhile though.

OK for anyone who cares, I just ran Eraser with 1-pass, and used Recuva, and it did much much better job. I wasn't able to recover any files.

I have the Thumbnail cache checked on CCleaner but it isn't being deleted off my PC? I search for thumbnails.db and I can still see them hidden on nearly all desktop/document folders.

People need to realize the free wipe offered by CCleaner is weak and doesn't entirely wipe the drive clean. I've used CCleaner to wipe my hard drive and then used Recuva to recover files, and there was enormous amount of files that were still recoverable. And yes, I ran the program using administrator priviledge. I'm going to use Eraser and see the difference with Recuva.

What is the best file recovering software... ? The ones used for computer forensics, top-notch state of the art software? Currently I'm using Recuva but I would like to know if there are better alternatives.

I used both Eraser and CCleaner to wipe my laptop hard drive with the same file erasure method. How come CCleaner takes only an hour, whereas Eraser takes upto 5-9 hrs using the same 1-pass (pseudorandrom) method with cluster tips enabled? What is Eraser doing that CCleaner isn't doing?

Or do the crime and save yourself A LOT of time by encrypting. LOL.

Or they could simply encrypt their whole hard drive with Truecrypt before doing anything illegal. Hidden or not.

I assumed this setting only applied to "Wipe Free Space" option.... or does it also apply to all of the options above it?

Well if your doing some serious illegal {THINGS}, then it's just a peace of mind to use more than 1-pass.

I don't want CCleaner to just delete system files but delete them for good, being unable to recover it. There should be an option for this. Temporary files, memory dumps... all these could contain sensitive informations.

I just wanted to be clear on what he posted earlier. Is it based on assumption or facts? Please don't mislead others with false information based on what you "believe".

True but you argued that "with enough computing power & time investment a good data recovery expert can recover most anything." How did you come to this conclusion? Did you just make that up or do you have facts to prove your statement? The website from my previous post argues otherwise.

http://whereismydata.wordpress.com/2009/05/24/forensics-can-data-forensic-companies-retrieve-overwritten-data/

Could data forensics recover files that are shredded using one pass?