Sinistral

I think this is a good idea too, though I think it should go one step further and say something like "Modifying the registry can cause serious system errors" when hovering over the greyed out button so user's know why it's for advanced users. I guess I'm playing Russian Roulette but I've never had a problem with the registry cleaner and I've never backed up before using it!

I just changed my Temp folder to D from the default C because my boot drive is solid state so I don't want extra wear-and-tear on it from temporary files. When I ran CCleaner the next time I noticed it tried cleaning the default Temp directory rather than the new one. I was able to create a custom include to clean out the new Temp folder (and it didn't delete or fuss over locked files which is awesome) but now I lose the functionality of it only deleting files older than 48 hours. CCleaner should rely on the system/user variable for the Temp directory rather than using the default for the OS it is running on (I'm just noting that XP uses a different directory than Vista/7).

Here's an interesting article I read. It talks about the differences between Secure Erase (ATE-SE) and block erasure methods (the typical pass over wipes I believe). The author of the post says, "However: remember that data CAN (probably) be recovered from a drive wiped by ATA-SE. Granted, the level of expertise and equipent is high and time committed is huge ? but it CAN (probably) be done." Now from what I've read isn't Secure Erase supposed to be infallible and work similar to how TRIM does?

So what is the minimum number of passes for totally safe erasure? :? We've got conflicting numbers here. I would think 1 pass should be fine since it resets everything to 1, 0 or random 1 & 0 sequences but I'm no expert.

Can you explain that a bit more please? I thought WFS was good every once in a while (maybe every 6 months) on traditional hard drive disks . Maybe I'm confused at what WFS is intended for. I thought it was to write over the free space left by deleted files (just for general security reasons). If you wanted to sell the drive wouldn't you want to do a few write-passes over the entire drive rather than just free space? Looks like the only thing to do then is to send the drive back to the manufacturer and hope then restore the firmware. I'm terribley scared about shutting my computer down now, even though I canceled the WFS partially through! Let's hope Piriform adds a flash media feature in the next version of CCleaner!

Thanks for the info guys. I didn't think it would be all that smart (especially if you did multiple passes) since it's rewriting info on the drive. My drive supports TRIM but I wonder what would be the best solution for older SSD that don't support it. I guess conventional erasure methods are really the only option. I stopped the wiping process on C part way through so I'll just have cross my fingers and hope I can reboot successfully next time I shut down! I'm going to make a 1:1 copy of C on D just to be safe. I'm sure a lot of people don't even realize they use solid state technology all the time with flash drives and memory cards. I use a program, Smart Defrag, that has an option to disable defrag optimizations on solid state drives. Piriform really should implement an option (on by default preferably) to prevent re-write cycles on solid state media.

My system partition (C drive) is a solid state drive. I use a 1.5 TB SATA drive on D for everything else. Is it harmful to the solid state drive if I wipe the free space on it? Thanks.