Preparing to sell a server

Question

I purchased a server about 6 months ago and it's been a huge learning experience. I'm now going to sell it - I've sold the sites that I was hosting on it. I'd like to sell it with formatted hard drives... what's the best way to do that? Is there anything else I need to do to it? I'm not storing any crazy personal information or anything on it.

It was running Ubuntu Server

score 16 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 27 '11 at 14:21

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What you might not think is crazy personal information still might be useful for somebody else. I'd recommend downloading a copy of DBAN and running it over the drives on the server to make sure everything is really gone.

answered Jan 27 '11 at 14:21

Jon Angliss

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I have advocated DBAN for years, great tool. Depending on the newness of the controller drivers *can* be an issue, so just be aware of that. – Scott Pack Jan 27 '11 at 14:30
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If you have trouble with DBAN, a Linux live CD with shred(1) works wonders for the paranoid. (paranoid == dd is not enough) – MikeyB Jan 27 '11 at 14:45
I can't remember the RAID configuration I used on the server... how will raid effect this software? – Ben Jan 27 '11 at 15:00
Do I just burn DBAN to a CD and then boot to it? – Ben Jan 27 '11 at 15:04
or just pull the disks and sell it without them. That's the usual way you see those things being sold when used. – Chase Florell Jan 27 '11 at 20:04
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@Webnet: Yup, burn it to a CD and start 'er up. – Matt Hanson Jan 28 '11 at 07:38

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 27 '11 at 14:23

Hunt around for 'Ultimate Boot CD'. You can burn an ISO of theirs to A CD, boot from it and select form one a a few tools that will do a multi-pass wipe of the drives.

Otherwise, blow the dust out of it and perhaps install a fresh copy of the OS, so it's more attractive as a purchase. It helps to demonstrate that it boots. :)

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered Jan 27 '11 at 14:45

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Unless you are selling the server as a black-box-providing-service, I would suggest that most people who get the server will be formatting the disks and installing their own OS as the first thing that they do.

I also endorse the DBAN as the way to go.

answered Jan 27 '11 at 14:45

David Mackintosh

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mkudlacek · Answer 4 · 2011-01-28T07:14:00.050

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Badblocks in write mode would be my choice. Available on every live cd/usb distro.

badblocks -svw /dev/sdX

edited Jan 28 '11 at 07:14

answered Jan 27 '11 at 14:43

mkudlacek

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Preparing to sell a server

4 Answers4