Originally Posted by Peerless

all things considered your worst fear should be the reaction of your significant other, if there is one...and that's if they are keeping track of what you are doing...

if the file is still listed as being there in your OS (i.e. you haven't deleted it yet) then some sort of data eraser set to overwrite the file multiple times should be OK for your situation....if you have already deleted it then defragging and then filling up your drive to the max should remove the data from 'easy' retrieval....

if this is a first time, one time, occurrence then forensic analysis of your HDD would prove that....

darin's boot and nuke is also available in .ISO format which can be put on a CD and booted from just like the floppy file...if you are that paranoid and want to follow that route then be aware that you do have a project for yourself...backing up all important data...doing the boot and nuke...then the reinstall of your OS...make sure to have ALL drivers available for use and install your chipset drivers just after you boot into the clean OS the first time then reboot and install other drivers...the chipset drivers are MotherBoard specific and tell it how to operate with the OS...

I would suggest that the first thing you do after getting basic drivers and such installed is to do a full update on the OS, then start installing the programs you wish...then upon completion of all the dirty work defrag the drive and go on with life....