• Quick-commands to wipe drives and clear EFI variables
• Notably performs full-drive TRIMs for SSDs (ArchWiki)
• Useful to perform before OS installations

• Ideally use openSUSE Tumbleweed's latest GNOME Live image on USB due to it having up-to-date tools, a GUI, and USB data persistence ¹⁾
• TODO: Leap GNOME: https://download.opensuse.org/download/distribution/openSUSE-stable/live/openSUSE-Leap-15.6-GNOME-Live-x86_64-Media.iso

• FreeBSD UFS mount (from Linux LiveUSB)
• Disk Format (GPT)
• Drive-to-drive rsync

sudo zypper install 'nvme-cli' -y && sync

sudo dnf install nvme-cli hdparm -y && sync

sudo apt install 'nvme-cli' -y && sync

• 2024/10: Seemingly broken in new-ish/6.11+ kernels but works fine from 6.6(?) in oS Leap 15.6

sudo smbios-thermal-ctl --set-thermal-mode='performance'

• Some motherboard firmware lock/freeze drives, and prevents some wipe commands from working
• Unlocking drives can be done with a suspend and wake
• This applies to both SATA and NVMe drives

sync && systemctl suspend

• Always check before running anything
• Assume nothing; all commands below are immediately destructive on the block device they're ran on

lsblk

sudo rm -f '/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/'* || sync && sudo efibootmgr -v

• Switching is done with nvme format --lbaf=1

sudo nvme id-ns '/dev/nvme0' --namespace-id='1' --human-readable

sudo smartctl --all '/dev/nvme0'

• This is using LBA Format 0
• Last tested: Samsung Electronics Co Ltd NVMe SSD Controller PM9A1/PM9A3/980PRO (only 1 LBA Format at 512)

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/nvme0n1' && sudo nvme format '/dev/nvme0' --force --namespace-id='1' --lbaf='0' --reset --ses='1' --pil='0' --pi='0' --ms='0' && sudo rm -f '/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/'* || sync

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/nvme0n1'

sudo nvme format '/dev/nvme0' --force --namespace-id='1' --lbaf='0' --reset --ses='1' --pil='0' --pi='0' --ms='0'

sudo wipefs --all --force '/dev/nvme0n1'

sudo dd if='/dev/zero' of='/dev/nvme0n1' count='1024'

sudo smartctl --all '/dev/sda'

sudo hdparm --set-sector-size '4096' '/dev/sda'

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/sda' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sda' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase 'x' '/dev/sda' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sda' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase-enhanced 'x' '/dev/sda' && sudo rm -f '/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/'* || sync

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/sda'

sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sda' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase 'x' '/dev/sda'

sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sda' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase-enhanced 'x' '/dev/sda'

sudo wipefs --all --force '/dev/sda'

sudo dd if='/dev/zero' of='/dev/sda' count='1024'

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/sdb' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdb' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase 'x' '/dev/sdb' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdb' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase-enhanced 'x' '/dev/sdb' && sudo rm -f '/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/'* || sync

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/sdb'

sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdb' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase 'x' '/dev/sdb'

sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdb' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase-enhanced 'x' '/dev/sdb'

sudo wipefs --all --force '/dev/sdb'

sudo dd if='/dev/zero' of='/dev/sdb' count='1024'

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/sdc' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdc' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase 'x' '/dev/sdc' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdc' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase-enhanced 'x' '/dev/sdc' && sudo rm -f '/sys/firmware/efi/efivars/'* || sync

sudo blkdiscard --force --verbose '/dev/sdc'

sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdc' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase 'x' '/dev/sdc'

sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-set-pass 'x' '/dev/sdc' && sudo hdparm --user-master u --security-erase-enhanced 'x' '/dev/sdc'

sudo wipefs --all --force '/dev/sdc'

sudo dd if='/dev/zero' of='/dev/sdc' count='1024'

• https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/4739473745776804012/?tscn=1641033020#c3203747342915419588
• https://steamcommunity.com/discussions/forum/1/3203745634155479256

• Steam and Oculus were known to be broken with 4K sector size on Windows 11
• Steam and Oculus worked fine with 4K sector size on Windows 10 LTSC 2021 and Linux
• iTunes possibly fails with 4K sectors due to Bonjour and dnssd.dll (post)

• https://community.wd.com/t/sn550-why-it-uses-512b-sector-instead-of-4096/250724
• https://filers.blogspot.com/2018/12/how-to-format-nvme-drive.html
• https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Advanced_Format
• https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/562571/switching-hdd-sector-size-to-4096-bytes
• https://www.thomas-krenn.com/en/wiki/Advanced_Sector_Format_of_Block_Devices