What's the best course of action here?

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Hello,

I currently have Windows XP installed on my Mac and I plan to remove it. I'm getting ready to upgrade and I'm going to give my current computer to a relative. My question is two parts:

1. If any virus is on XP, once I uninstall the XP partition, can the virus affect my Mac? I'm not sure if I have a virus - should I do a scan to be sure before I remove XP? I don't have virus protection on XP as I rarely use it for the Internet but I realize I could still be infected.

2. If I perform a secure empty trash on my Mac after removing the XP partition, will that delete the hard drive files that were previously on the XP side, too? Or should I wipe the XP Partition separately first?

I hope my questions made some sense. I'm not very technical. :Confused:

Thank you in advance!
 
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Your Mac's Specs
Phenom X3 720, Radeon 4870 1GB, 6GB DDR2-800, 32" LCD TV
1. No. Viruses are just software programs. If your Windows partition was suffering from a virus, erasing the partition will remove the virus. And any virus you may have can't be run on a Mac because it was written for Windows.

2. Yes and no. You don't have to wipe the XP partition first, but secure empty trash isn't what you want to do. In order to prevent anyone from recovering your old files, you'll have to go into Disk Utility and tell it to erase your free space. You can also do a "secure format" of the XP partition before reintegrating it if you want. Either one works.
 
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J
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Thank you very much for your response - it was very helpfu! I was afraid this may be a lengthy process, but by following your advice I think it will pretty painless.

Thanks again!
 

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