Encrypting a hard drive

[chrispadfield]

I have a hard drive in my PC that basically contains backups of data from all other the place. It most likely has old password files and things like that I wouldn't want someone to have access to.

What would be a good way to encrypt the whole hard drive? Ideally it would be completly encrypted and then if I wanted to use it I would enter my password and that would give me half an hour or so of access to it until a password was needed again.

I am running Vista (64 bit)

Any ideas?

[ManagerJosh]

In case I don't see you online..

http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/Windows/en-US/Help/e895bd18-36e5-4229-8424-dff307b155c21033.mspx

[mlx]

I would strongly recommend TrueCrypt: http://www.truecrypt.org/

I don't really like that EFS feature. However if you use it:

it is highly recommended when first using efs that you export your public and private keys to another storage medium (cipher /?) - these keys are randomly generated at creation, similar installs will not create similar keys. strangely there is no prompt when first using efs, and thus many people are unaware of the risk or forget. it is also advisable to create a recovery agent, though some users may decide not to for security reasons.

P.S. as you are mentioning old password files ... a great software to securely manage your passwords is KeePass: http://www.keepass.info/

[Joe Gronlund]

Windows EFS and Truecrypt are both great options.

I don't use either, but i would use EFS if i had too..