Hi, I have an Inspiron 8100 which I will be replacing in the next month or so.  I want to sell it, but obviously want to format the HD.  I would just as soon do a low level format and reinstall the Dell programs that originally came with the system, so the new owner will have what I had when it was purchased.  I had to do a low level format (I am assuming that is what I did) a year ago because of an major malfunction that tech support attributed to a virus.  They walked me through the process of deleting everything on the HD and in the memory before reinstalling everything.  I don't remember how to do it however, and am looking for help.  I have a Hitachi hard drive.

 

I have looked into software that supposedly clears all the data (active @ kill disk, etc) but am not sure what to make of the freeware version some of them offer.

 

Any advice would be great!