Any Reason Not to Go Back to Eraser 5.7?

[Jakareh]

After I was forced to restore my computer to its original settings, I wanted to have Eraser back, so I downloaded the latest version, which was 6.0.8, if I'm not mistaken. The first time I tried erasing a file with the new version, however, I noticed a big difference for the worse. Whereas the old version would wipe out small files in an instant, the new version took about a minute just to start erasing a small file, and considerably longer for a large file, the folder in which the file was located being non-responsive in the meantime. When it did at long last start erasing, it was also slower than before (I would say 2 or 3 times). So I uninstalled version 6.x and installed version 5.7 which I found somewhere on the 'Net.

My question: is there a good reason not to do that? Version 6.x has a prettier interface and more choices as to the erasing algorithm, but given its slowness, I'm quite willing to live without those. Is there some kind of vulnerability with version 5.x that makes it unwise to still use it? I appreciate any input from knowledgeable individuals.

 

[Joel]

For some people, the fact that the developers are not supporting it any more is sufficient reason to not use it. But if you find that it works better for you, by all means. No, there has been no reported vulnerability to any Eraser versions (at least, none that was brought to my attention.)

Although, I am quite curious why Eraser 6 is any slower than that of Eraser 5. It should not be the case. Eraser 6 does not deviate that much from its approach to erasures (indeed it has not changed much) I'm not sure what is the problem exactly, though from the sounds of it this seems to be due to the default erasure method (Gutmann) being used instead of a one-pass overwrite. You can change that setting in the Settings to another erasure algorithm of your choice.

For Explorer windows open after the file has been erased, it should not have any impact. The only time I've seen this happen is when the window open is one pointing to a network share over a high latency connection. Alternatively, it could be the anti virus application acting up; both situations are not unheard of.