But what if the hard drive was damaged?
Hardware & Technical PC died, won't be playing Elite fo a while
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But what if the hard drive was damaged?
Then wiping it would do nothing, as it is damaged and a new hard drive would be needed.
I find that you tend to get more for your money when building yourself. Like better quality ram, larger PSU etc.
So while I normally end up paying slightly more than I would have for an off the shelf PC, I ultimately end up with a much better specced one than my money would have bought.
In saying that I haven't built an entire PC from scratch since I needed to upgrade to a better motherboard for a new processor a couple of years ago. I've been just upgrading off that platform since, probably will continue to for another generation of processors or so.
Depending on how much upgrading you want to do and how often you plan to buy a new PC, plus how fancy you want to get with the hardware I would say that whether you build or you buy is mostly about personal preference. There's pros and cons to both.
At least when you buy you'll never have that sickening feeling when you make a mistake with a very expensive piece of hardware and have no one to blame but TJ
While true, I think edz was probably more on about if the shop put a test hdd in and it worked then the OP got it back and his HDD was damaged the immediate response would have been (for most people) to assume a shoddy repair. Rather than suspect that the one removed piece of hardware was faulty.
But if the shop put in a test HDD and it worked, then the shop would know it was the HDD that was the problem and replace it.
whilst this is the logical approach it is standard practice to protect sensitive customer data (which should be backed up) by wiping the hard disk completely back to factory default for testing.
Also true, plus you don't need to buy it all at once when you build your own...
If that is true, Spock would be most disappointed! and makes me pretty glad I put together and fix my own PC's .. 'Cos that's just dumb. In my view the best way to protect sensitive data woud be to remove the HDD as soon as it is about to be repaired/tested. you can't read data from a disconnected HDD.
Yep. When I bought mine from a UK specialist builder they sent it packed with foam inserts for transport, and several integirty stickers. The instructions were to remove the case side, remove the packing foam, replace the case side, test the system then put integrity stickers over the gaps and send them a photograph of the intact seals to activate the warranty.
Needless to say I told them I would treat any individual component failure as an individual fault and would exercise my rights accordingly. To be fair to them, even though the hardware was fine I did have some configuration issues that they helped with even though I hadn't "activated" my warranty. I got the distinct feeling that the sticker thing was there to protect them from end customers who didn't know what they were doing, rather than enthusiasts who did.
These days in the UK the savings made by building your own system are slim to nil, unlike 20 years ago, but the experience can be useful. Then if you do buy an off-the-shelf or custom system in future you can do your own upgrades and repairs without sending the whole thing away.
Good luck OP. I hope your system is back in the land of the living soon.
under the new European GDPR rules they have to wipe the data if they're not legally allowed to access it ..
A warranty repair on the PC which you have given them your permission to undertake, would mean they could access your data on the hard disk for diagnostic purposes.
if they have to replace the hard disk, or if they had to completely replace the machine before returning it to you, then the old one would need to be wiped, but just to fix an issue with the PC this is a bit overkill.
Building one's own PC is really easy. If an old fart like I can do it, with my weak eyes and clumsy fingers, then anybody can do it.
Plus, building your own tends to be a LOT cheaper than off the shelf (or, worse, custom-built).
Plus, once you finish the build and do a POST on it for the first time, you get to see the POST screen. Open the windows and scream at the top of your lungs: "IT'S ALIVE!!! IT'S ALIVE!!!!!" followed by crazy laughter. I did.
See: http://eldorf.tripod.com/newpc/ - scroll to the bottom. Scared the hell out of the neighbors.
One other thing: please always (once per day) back up your data. I have a 1-tb drive that is used for backup. If you have a Steam account, all those games purchased from there are in one folder. If you have to replace the HDD it saves TONS of time from downloading the games again. You'll still have to download some log files, etc but it still saves oodles of time if you ever have to replace a HDD.
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Generally, once a PSU "pops" for any reason you cannot trust it again. It's one of the few components in a pc that can take out the rest of your system.
If it didn't do it the first time, there is a very good chance it would do it on the second.
It is highlighting a problem though, there is no way a decent PSU should be popping within a year. I have a PSU that is around ten years old in one system, still running without issue.
When there is hot summer, the afternoon, I do not use the PC, to protect it.
Anyway, if the weather is nice I go outside under the blue sky and the sun
Anyway, if the weather is nice I go outside under the blue sky and the sun
A system well built with quality components, and run within spec or given reasonable margins, should be able to operate 24/7 for years in conditions that would kill a person in short order.
Very rare for everything, or even the majority of the components, in a system to be damaged, even if it's been thoroughly trashed.
Heck, there are people out there that toss hardware that is in perfect condition for software issue.