Q: how do I wipe my emac?

OK thanks, I skipped secure delete, went directly to reinstall with OS10 disc.  Dialog box said reinstall would erase everything on hard disc.  After reinstall I cannot find any personal info anywhere on computer. Looks like this was successful. thanks again!

Hmmm, suspected I left something out. So is there any way I can backtrack and find method of secure erase??

OK BDAqua, I went thru procedure outlined above, it was very easy to follow, with one little glitch. When i opened disc utility and went to erase, all of the info was greyed out, volume format, options, erase, could not perform any operations as described. i went into disc utility help re "can't select anything in disc utility" I clicked the lock, re-entered admin info, no go. even tried adding a new admin, still not able to activate erase button. Appears I followed correct procedure, still not able to complete. I do see a comment under can't select anything "You cannot erase or partition the current startup disc"  Does this have anything to do with issue??

Yes it was greyed out, actually there was no "erase free space" on my emac, screen looked the same as in the graphic, except the choices were "options" and "erase". There were only two items displayed in the box on left "59.50 MB"  followed by "Macintosh HD"  selecting either of them resulted in greyed out erase button. Same with partition, all the options were greyed out. I spent quite a while looking for some method to highlight them but couldn'd find any.  Is there an way to go directly to deleted items on hard drive and then secure delete them?

I don't  know what options does, like I said it was greyed out. Your disc utility display shows a "security options" button. My display shows only options and erase -- no secure erase.

I'm wondering if I have already deleted everything and just didn't realize it? In looking at disc utility info screen, it indicates I have 55.9 GB capacity and 53.67 available, I.e. only 2.2 GB has been used. Before more than half of the available GBs had been used...

When I bought a new MacBook Pro the Apples store transferred all info, settings, basically everything from the eMac. I then went thru eMac and moved all my personal info, files, sensitive data onto rw CDs, so I wonder if in moving them it deleted from the eMac hard drive, so there's no free space to erase, and then I wiped the hard drive so that's why the erase button is greyed out?

Sorry to be such a bother, but I'm at a loss to account for why it's so involved to accomplish this.  I have used Apple products for over 20 years, still feel I'm running full tilt just to stay with the pack :-)

Would it do any good looking for a pathway into the "free space", see if I can access that, then delete whatever is on there?

OK here you go, these are the hardware stats, as presently loaded.  I had OS 10.5.8 before I wiped computer:

name - eMac

identifier -Power PC G4

processor name Power PC G4

processor speed 1GHz

CPUs - 2 -- 1 at 512 MB, 1 at 256 MB

Version - Mac OS X 10.2.4 (6J73)

L2 cache - 256K

memory - 768 MB

bus speed - 133 MHz

thanks much!

Yes I do have 'em, when i used them for reinstall the instructions indicated that doing reinstall would delete everything on hard drive. I'm wondereing if this earlier edition was set up to erase everything, hence no erase free space option? My emac is proably 10 years old, at least...

As i mentioned, system was up to 10.5.8 when I reinstalled, I'll bet that version has erase free space option. 

Still the fact that only 2.2 GB have been used with reinstall leads me to think that only startup up items and original apps are there. So the question is -- is there a secret cache somewhere that someone capable enough could hack into??  And if so, can a person of moderate computerese figure out how to access it?? Guess that's today's brain teaser ;-)