I am returning a work laptop to my employer. Before I return it I want to delete all my email messagea. There are several thousand of them.
I can't find anything in Help that explains how to do it in one fell swoop. It is Microsoft Outlook and the OS is Vista Business.
How do I do it?
Thanks.

My second problem is that I have made a backup of all my files onto an external hard drive - Seagate Go - with the intention of transferring them to a personal laptop. However, in the course of the backup I saw a note (from Seagate) that it will not be possible to transfer Vista documents to an XP computer.
As I see it my options are
1. Buy a Vista OS and put it onto my personal laptop, first having formatted the hard drive
2. Buy a new laptop with Vista on it

Is there another way?
Thanks

Hi Laird,

How to Purge Deleted Messages in Outlook

Once you have followed that route, you should have Ccleaner
installed.
Just open Ccleaner and -> Options -> Settings -> in Secure Deletion click Secure File Deletion and in the drop down select DOD 5220.22-M (3 Passes)

Then run the cleaner element of Ccleaner. It will take a few minutes but will overwrite any bits that were left behind after doing the purge.

Looking into your backup problem and will be back.

dave

Just a quickie about your backups.

What format extension where they saved in, where the Office Documents and if so what Office program do you have on the laptop?
Is it Microsoft Office (if so which version) or Microsoft Works.

dave

Thanks Dave for coming in on this.

All my files are Microsoft Office
Word, Excel etc 2007

Got it now,
you have been using MS Office to make and save the documents.

Regarding the 'saw a note from Seagate' do you remember what it said?

If you do not have MS Office on the XP Laptop then you would not be able top open the backed up files.
I don't understand the bit about not being able to open with XP because if you have Office on the XP computer it will open the backups when you save them there. The operating system should not have any effect on which computer it will run.

If you have a MS Office disk then install it on the XP Laptop and your backup files should open.
If you do not have a disk, then download and install Open Office.
It should open Microsoft Ofice documents and also Excell files.


dave

Clarifying information.
The OS on my work laptop is Vista business.
The OS on my own laptop is XP.
Now, when I backed up my work laptop onto the Seagate FreeAgent Go external hard disc it says in the accompanying user manual that files from a Vista laptop cannot be synchronised (meaning, transferred) to a XP system computer.
I have Microsoft Office on the XP laptop.
Unfortunately, I am abroad at the moment and my personal laptop is at home in the UK. I have at the moment my work laptop but have to leave it behind when I return to the UK and that's the problem. I need to be able to take all my files with me on an external hard drive. Before I head for the flight home I have to delete everything on this laptop - hence my earlier qustion about deleting all my emails.

Can you purchase an external hard drive where you are now.
Just a basic 250GB USB External Hard drive will do?

Download & Install Microsoft Sync Toys free.

Plug in the USB Ext HD and open open the explorer.
Right click and select New Folder.
Name it Docs Back Up (or something similar).

Open Sync Toys
Set a Pair by picking the Documents Folder on the laptop and selecting the new Docs Backup Folder on the Ext HD.

Select Echo to copy and update all files from the left folder to the right folder.
(You will know what I am talking about when you have it set it.)
Click Preview and it will check which folders to copy over that are not already on the HD, which will be all of them.

Then click to Run it.

Repeat with any other folders such as My Pictures or any others.

Check that all you want to save is on the Ext HD and you can delete what you want from the computer.

*****************************

When you gat home, just download and install SyncToys from teh link above and set up matching pairs between the XP computer and the Ext HD.

BE CAREFULL to select which way you want the sync to work.
It can clear all off the XP Laptop or, if you make a new folder in My Docs, you can set it to just sync from the HD to the new folder.

If you are not quite sure when you get to this stage, post back.

dave

Thanks.
That's the way to go. I'll buy another hard drive and do as you suggest.
If I run into problems I'll get back to you.
Cheers

Laird,
You can have a look at Eraser 6 to see if it will overwrite your emails.

http://eraser.heidi.ie/

dave

Dave,
Thanks.
I downloaded Sync Toys and then I went and bought an Ext HD.
When I installed it I found that it came with a programme that seems to do the same as Sync Toys and nowhere in the manual does it say that there is a conflict between Vista and XP. So I used the built in software and have copied my 80 GBs of files onto the disc. And the plus is that I can see all my files by name, the same as I see them on the computer, so I know I've got them. I can't stand these backup drives that encrypt the files and there is no way (that I know of) to see if you have your files on the backup.
I took a quick look at Eraser and will get serious with it when it comes to crunch time before I leave, and I have to delete everything on this laptop.

Thanks for your help.
Cheers

Success so far.

The software on the HD should then be able to load all your stuff onto the XP laptop when you get home.

Any problems and you can always revert to SynToy on the XP laptop, to copy the stuff over.

dave