[ale] A little math

[Geoffrey]

scott boss wrote:
> If you write something other than /dev/random (or urandom) then it
> will go much master.
> 
> If you want to wipe the drive with random data, I have a better option
> for you...

I'm really trying to understand the significance of writing random data. 
  What's the difference between that and simply writing nulls?  You are 
overwriting it?

> 
> Sent from my mobile...
> 
> On Feb 10, 2010, at 21:57, Scott Castaline <skotchman at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> I decided to pull the plug on the writing of random data on my 1TB
>> drive, as I was getting to impatient, wanting to get this done. As it
>> turned out it had written about 251GB worth of data within about
>> 15hrs,
>> so my original calculation of 8 days and some was way off. Looks more
>> like a little under 2.5 days. Hmmm I wonder how long with a 16way
>> MoBo?
>> Damn the significant other hid the credit card :(
>>
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-- 
Until later, Geoffrey

"I predict future happiness for America if they can prevent
the government from wasting the labors of the people under
the pretense of taking care of them."
- Thomas Jefferson