This sounds like some sort of accessibility feature is enabled(perhaps stickykeys or something). If you are using windows, open the accessibility control panel and turn off everything you don't need.
Does the cutter speak HPGL? If so, then you are in luck. Most vector-based drawing programs(such as inkscape) as well as most cad programs(such as qcad) allow saving as HPGL. Then it's just a matter of sending the HPGL file to your plotter:
cat foo.hgpl > /dev/ttyS0
or whatever your cutter...
So basically you're trying to avoid being busted for plagiarism? I've never heard of a program that will do that for you. And I doubt any such program will be sufficiently advanced so as to not be extremely easily detected by anyone who reads the output. But good luck in your search. :)
Big chain stores like BB and CC tend to not throw out anything worthwhile.
Possibly. Chances of anything happening are quite slim, though. Firstly, the store probably doesn't own the dumpster; thusly, anything placed in the dumpster is technically property of the garbage collection company...
huh? Have you seen the prices items tend to go for on ebay? Pretty close to what they are worth. There isn't some magical retailer out there who sells stuff considerably cheaper than everyone else. If there was, then wouldn't everyone be shopping there already?
Check out gparted. You'll probably be interested in the livecd. But if you just want to create a partition in the empty space then you can just use the windows disk management control panel.
http://limestone.truman.edu/~dbindner/guide/main.html
That is a guide that a couple professors at my old university wrote. Probably not the best, and it isn't comprehensive, but it's a good starting point to get an idea of how to do things. Some of it is Truman-specific, but you can ignore...