How to Wipe WD External Hard Drive?

Quick Navigation:

• How Important It Is to Wipe Data?
• Considerations Before You Wipe Your WD External Hard Drive
• Three Ways to Wipe A WD External Hard Drive on Windows PC or Mac
• Conclusion
• FAQs About Wiping WD External Hard Drive

Think about your old WD external hard drive, full of memories, private files, and work papers you don't want others to see. Imagine it got into the wrong hands because the data wasn't completely erased. That sounds scary, right? Don't worry! Here is a guide on safely deleting everything from your WD external hard drive.

This guide is great for people interested in technology, wanting to take better care of their devices, or wanting more storage space. Wiping your WD external hard drive will not be hard to understand. It will protect your data even after you no longer have your trusted storage partner.

How Important It Is to Wipe Data?

Before you get into how to safely erase data from your WD external hard drive, it's important to know why you need to do it. You don't delete things from your hard drive when you do that. Instead, the operating system marks the room those files take up as free for new data. Data recovery tools can recover the deleted/formatted files until that place is written over.

In particular, this is very dangerous for security when working with private or sensitive data. If you want to keep your data private when you sell or give away your WD external hard drive, you can't just delete the files. When you wipe the drive, you safely erase all the data, making it almost impossible to restore.

Considerations Before You Wipe Your WD External Hard Drive

Take some safety measures before wiping the data to ensure you don't lose any data by accident and that you're wiping the right drive.

• Back up Important Data: If you want to keep any of the data on your WD external hard drive, back it up to a different storage device or the cloud before you wipe it.
• Verify Drive Selection: Make sure the WD external hard drive you want to wipe is right. If you accidentally erase the wrong drive, you could lose info that can't be recovered.
• Disconnect Other Drives: Ensure no external drives or storage devices are linked to your computer before wiping. It will keep you from accidentally deleting data.
• Ensure Sufficient Power: Ensure your WD external hard drive has enough power during the wiping process. An abrupt loss of power can stop the process and damage the drive.

Three Ways to Wipe A WD External Hard Drive on Windows PC or Mac

There are a few safe ways to delete everything from your WD external hard drive; each works differently and is a little more difficult.

Method 1: Using Built-in WD Drive Utilities

Western Digital's WD Drive Utilities is a set of tools for managing drives that includes safe ways to delete data from your WD external hard drive.

• Start by visiting the Western Digital website and downloading the WD Drive Utilities software package.
• After downloading WD Drive Utilities, you can run it on your computer. Just do what it says on the screen to finish the installation without any problems.
• Start up the WD Drive Utilities program on your computer after installing it.
• Find and pick your WD external hard drive from the list of connected drives in the WD Drive Utilities interface.
• Select your WD external hard drive and choose "Erase Drive" in the WD Drive Utilities window.
• It could take a while to erase all the data on your WD external hard drive, depending on its size and the way you choose.
• After wiping the data is done, you should make sure that all the data on your WD external hard drive has been safely erased.
• Your WD external hard drive can now be reused, recycled, or thrown away without worrying about losing important data because the data-wiping process is complete.

Method 2: Using Disk Management Or Disk Utility

Windows and macOS operating systems have disk management tools that let you format and wipe storage devices, such as WD external hard drives.

Format WD external hard drive on Windows PC:

• Windows users can open Disk Management by right-clicking on the Start menu and picking "Disk Management" from the list that comes up.
• Find the WD external hard drive, right-click it and choose Format.
• Select a file system(such as NTFS), then start to format the WD external hard drive.

Format WD external hard drive on Mac:

• To get to the Disk Utility tool on macOS, go to Applications > Utilities > Disk Utility.
• Find and select the WD external hard drive, click Erase.
• Select a file system (such as ExFAT, APFS, Mac OS Extended), then click Erase again.
• When the process gets finished, click Done.

Note: The formatted data is not lost for good and can be recovered by data recovery software.

Method 3: Using Third-Party Disk Wipe Software

Several third-party data wiping programs can safely erase data from storage devices and offer numerous advanced features.

1. To safely delete data from the WD hard drive, you should first look into and choose a third-party data-wiping software program.
2. Once you've chosen the data-erasing software you want to use, go to its official website or a reliable source to download it.
3. Start the data-erasing software on your computer after it has been installed. The screen will give you several choices and tools for removing data safely from storage devices.
4. Find and pick an external hard drive from the list of connected drives shown in the data-wiping software's interface.
5. Once you have chosen the hard drive, follow the software's directions to start the data-wiping process.
6. Wait patiently, as wiping the data on the WD external hard drive may take a while, based on its size and the method you choose.
7. After using the third-party software to delete all the data, your WD external hard drive is now ready to be reused, recycled, or thrown away.

DoYourData Super Eraser is one of the best disk wipe software and it can help securely wipe your WD external hard drive with advanced data erasure standards including Peter Gutmann, U.S. Army AR380-19, DoD 5220.22-M ECE, etc.

DoYourData Super Eraser can help you wipe WD external hard drive on Windows PC and Mac. Just connect the WD external hard drive to your computer and open DoYourData Super Eraser, choose Wipe Hard Drive mode. Select the WD external hard drive, click on Wipe Now button to permanently erase all data from the drive.

Conclusion:

Protecting sensitive information is very important in today's digital world. Wiping your WD external hard drive protects you from privacy breaches and people accessing your private data without your permission.

You can safely delete all the data on your device using the steps listed, including the built-in WD Drive Utilities, disk control tools, or third-party disk wipe software. This WD external hard drive will keep your data safe whether you recycle it, use it for something else, or throw it away. Do something today to protect your data and stop worrying about hackers and data breaches.

FAQs About Wiping WD External Hard Drive

1. I have formatted my WD external hard drive, all data is lost forever?

No, the formatted data is still there and can be recovered by data recovery software. If you want to permanently erase all data from your WD external hard drive, just try disk wipe software.

2. How to wipe a WD external hard drive?

Disk wipe software, such as DoYourData Super Eraser, can help you securely wipe your WD external hard drive, leaving no trace for data recovery:

• Download and install DoYourData Super Eraser.
• Connect the WD external hard drive to the computer.
• Open DoYourData Super Eraser, choose Wipe Hard Drive mode.
• Select the WD external hard drive and click on Wipe Now button.
• Format and wipe the WD external hard drive.

3. What is the best WD disk wipe software?

Here is the list of top 5 WD disk wipe software:

• WD Drive Utilities
• DoYourData Super Eraser
• AweEraser
• Donemax Data Eraser
• DBAN

4. Is the erased data lost for good?

Yes, if the data stored on the WD external hard drive is erased by disk wipe software, the data is lost for good, cannot be recovered by any software or data recovery method.