Forum Discussion
How do I permanently delete files, photos from sd card on Windows PC?
When files are deleted from an SD card, they aren't immediately erased; instead, the space they occupy is marked as available for new data. Until that space is overwritten, it's possible to recover the deleted files using specialized software.
To permanently delete files from SD card, you have to first use the large movies files to eat up the storage one more times. This will overwrite all existing data and make them unrecoverable. You can also do with a data erasing software.
Using the command line method to completely wipe SD card is actually a good choice, especially if you don't want to rely on third-party tools. I have used the Diskpart command before, which is easy to use and more thorough than normal formatting.
The specific steps are as follows:
- Open the Command Prompt (CMD): Type "cmd" in the Windows search bar, then right-click and select "Run as administrator".
- Start Diskpart: Type diskpart in the command prompt and press Enter.
- List all disks: Type list disk and press Enter. This will list all connected disks, including SD cards.
- Select your SD card: Find the number corresponding to the SD card, type select disk X, replace X with the number of the SD card, and press Enter.
- Clear data: Type the clean command and press Enter. This command will clear all partitions and data.
- Recreate partitions and format: Type create partition primary to recreate the partitions, and then use format fs=fat32 quick to quickly format the SD card.
This command line method is much more thorough than normal formatting because it clears the partition table. After that, data recovery is almost impossible. I feel this method is quite safe and suitable for completely erase file on SD card.
