I have two SSDs in my laptop. one is SATA 500GB and the other is M.2 SATA 250 GB. I used the following steps for both to securly erase them so that I can sell the laptop:
- unfreeze the drives:
sudo systemctl suspend
- Set a User Password:
hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass mypass /dev/sdx
- Issue the ATA Secure Erase command:
time hdparm --user-master u --security-erase mypass /dev/sdx
I have 3 questions
- It is completed too fast in less than 3 seconds. Is it normal?
- Does the length of mypass matters?
- Whats is the advantage of using
--security-erase-enhanced
instead of--security-erase