قبل ما تسلم الجهاز، امسح البيانات.

No. In قبل ما, ما is not a negation.

In Egyptian Arabic, قبل ما is a very common way to say before when a verb clause follows:

• قبل ما تسلم الجهاز = before you hand over the device

So here ما is just part of the expression قبل ما. It does not mean not.

A useful contrast:

• قبل الجهاز = before the device or in front of the device depending on context
• قبل ما تسلم الجهاز = before you hand over the device

If you are learning formal Arabic too, this often corresponds to قبل أن in MSA.

Because after قبل ما, Egyptian Arabic usually uses the bare imperfect verb, not the بـ form.

So:

• قبل ما تسلم = correct and natural
• قبل ما بتسلم = usually not what you want here

In Egyptian, بـ often marks habitual or ongoing action, but after conjunctions like قبل ما, the verb normally appears without it.

Also, in everyday Arabic writing, short vowels and sometimes even the shadda are often not written. So تسلم here is understood as the verb تسلِّم / tesallim or tisallim, from سلّم = to hand over / deliver.

That is a very common confusion, because the root س-ل-م shows up in several related words and expressions.

Here, تسلم comes from سلّم and means:

• to hand over
• to deliver
• to turn in

So قبل ما تسلم الجهاز means before you hand over the device.

But yes, forms from the same root can mean other things in different contexts, such as:

• تِسلم as an expression = may you stay well, often used like thanks / bless you
• يسلّم على = to greet someone
• السلام = peace

Context tells you which meaning is intended. Since the sentence talks about the device and the data, hand over is clearly the right meaning here.

By itself, تسلم can indeed be ambiguous in unvowelled Arabic writing. It could potentially be understood as:

• you masculine singular hand over
• she hands over

But in this sentence, the second part is an imperative:

• امسح البيانات = erase the data

That makes the whole sentence a direct instruction to someone, so تسلم is naturally understood as you hand over.

So the full sentence is addressed to one male person unless context says otherwise.

As written, this is addressed to one man or to someone in a default masculine singular form.

Masculine singular

• قبل ما تسلم الجهاز، امسح البيانات.

Feminine singular

• قبل ما تسلمي الجهاز، امسحي البيانات.

Plural

• قبل ما تسلموا الجهاز، امسحوا البيانات.

In spoken Egyptian, people are often flexible in casual pronunciation, but these are the standard colloquial forms.

It can mean both, depending on context.

The verb مسح basically means to wipe. But with digital things like files, phones, or computers, it naturally extends to:

• erase
• delete
• wipe

So:

• امسح البيانات = erase the data
• literally, something like wipe the data

This is very natural Arabic. English does something similar too when we say wipe a drive.

Because the sentence is talking about a specific device and the data on it, not just any device or any data in general.

• الجهاز = the device
• البيانات = the data

In instructions, Arabic often uses the definite form when the item is already understood from the situation.

For example, if someone is returning a company laptop or phone, both speaker and listener know which device and which data are meant.

Yes, and Arabic handles it a bit differently.

بيانات is the normal Arabic word for data, and it is morphologically a plural form. Even when English speakers think of data as one mass concept, Arabic commonly uses بيانات.

So امسح البيانات is the natural way to say:

• erase the data
• wipe the data

This is standard and very common in tech, business, and admin language.

It is very understandable, and it sits fairly close to MSA vocabulary, but the structure قبل ما is especially colloquial and very natural in Egyptian.

A more formal MSA-style version would be:

• قبل أن تسلّم الجهاز، امسح البيانات.

So the main colloquial feature here is:

• Egyptian: قبل ما
• MSA: قبل أن

The words الجهاز and البيانات are used in both Egyptian and MSA.

Yes, absolutely. That is also natural.

Both are fine:

• قبل ما تسلم الجهاز، امسح البيانات.
• امسح البيانات قبل ما تسلم الجهاز.

The difference is mostly emphasis:

• starting with قبل ما تسلم الجهاز highlights the time condition first
• starting with امسح البيانات puts the command first

In everyday speech, both are common.

A natural Egyptian-style pronunciation would be roughly:

Qabl ma tesallim el-gehaaz, imsaḥ el-bayanaat.

A few notes:

• قبل is often pronounced qabl or sometimes with a lighter first sound depending on the speaker
• تسلم here is understood as tesallim / tisallim
• الجهاز is commonly el-gehaaz
• امسح is imsaḥ
• البيانات is el-bayanaat

If you want to sound natural, the stress and rhythm matter more than making every vowel perfect.