TEKTHING

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TekThing 51: Thermite, Acid, & Hammers Make Data Gone Forever! Do You Trust Your NAS? De-Upgrade Windows 10...

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Today's Topics: 
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Wipe Your Hard Drive... 
We get a lot of questions about what kind of hard drive destruction would work best, and to be honest…  a lot of you want something more cathartic than running DBAN wipe software. Will beating the HD platters with a hammer work? To quote Scott Moulton, a great Computer Forensic and Recovery expert (and trainer!) "Physical damage to a drive is very efficient if it does any platter damage at all." Find out more in the video, as open up and look inside hard drives, break glass platters, dip 'em in acid, and melt them with Thermite! 
Thermite vs. Hard Drive:
Our friend and viewer Ed joins us to melt a drive with Thermite, explain how it works, and more... it's pretty amazing!
NAS Safety & Backups: 
Tom's worried about NAS boxes failing and writes, "One of the things that has always bothered me about NAS boxes is that it seems to me that you are putting all your eggs in one basket. Also - how can you backup a 10 TB or larger NAS box! I'm sure it's not impossible, but seems like it would be a lot of work." We explain how the 3-2-1 Backup Rule applies to NAS boxes, and more in the video! 
AT&T Developer Hackathon:
We'll be hosting the 24 hour Hackathon, January 2-3 at the Palms Resort and Casino in Vegas the weekend before CES! Teams get 24 hours to develop an app from start to finish and compete for the grand prize of $25,000, along with second and third prizes for $10 and $5 grand. Register for free at geekslife.com/att with the coupon code geekslife. #sponsored
HCL Vs. Hard Drive: 
Did we mention Hydrochloric Acid for destroying drive platters? It's the sloth of our day of data destruction: pour acid into glass container, insert drive platter and... wait... Woah, what, just happened??? We've got video!  
Can I Swap An Old Windows 10 HD Into A New PC? 
Greg emails, "My Core 2 Quad desktop is getting long in the tooth, and owes me nothing, so I've bought myself a new Skylake based rig. I'm just waiting on the CPU to arrive, then I'm all set. Now, I do a lot of virtual machine work and audio muxing and my current hard drive (Win10) is exactly how I want it. I'd like to avoid a rebuild if I can and drop it right into my new rig? Is this possible?" We talk swapping a Win10 drive into a new PC, authenticating, and, of course, backing up first in the video! 
Downgrade Windows 10 to 7? 
Martin's worried about his free Windows 10 upgrade, if I "do the update and decide to not like it, would I be able to simply bring back good old Windows 7?" More thoughts in the video, but Windows 10 is built ot uninstall itself in the first month if you choose. And here's the step by step Win7 reinstall link from How To Geek
Do Something Analog: 
Spend the holidays with your family, not on your phone!