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Help with Duplicate file finder!


dragoarms

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Hello, recently i got Ccleaner specifically for the duplicate file finder, i want to remove the 100gbs or so of duplicate files without deleting the original, does Ccleaner only display duplicates and leave one file as an original or do i have to individually select one file to be the original from each folder? thank you hope to hear soon.

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100 GB removal?  :o

 

If I were you I'd play it extra paranoid safe and not trust anything going by mere filename or filesize alone! You may want or need more security to keep your originals and I'd highly recommend having a tool that can compare the checksum/hash of those files (in particular at least MD5 or SHA-1) such as the free Nirsoft HashMyFiles, etc., that way you'll know if you're actually removing a duplicate or not because some files can share the same filename and not be a duplicate at all.

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I'll also suggest a very good backup/imaging regime before proceeding.

100Gbs of files is exceptional, so you can expect the process to go astray somewhere.

Why, because CC doesn't know which of the multiple copies found is the original, YOU have to decide on the (limited) information provided by CC.

 

If your goal is to just free up space by finding files that can be deleted then perhaps letting CC do a normal crap removal process followed by running another free program called TreeSize to find the largest space consuming culprits will suffice.

Backup now & backup often.
It's your digital life - protect it with a backup.
Three things are certain; Birth, Death and loss of data. You control the last.

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  • 3 weeks later...

I have the same issue - nearly every file on this machine is duplicated anywhere from 2 to 13 times, maybe more!  The program has been running for an hour and is STILL running as I type.  I'm seeing files listed for images that I know were downloaded to CD and then deleted and trashed (I know, nothing is ever really gone). What's going to happen if I just delete EVERY file found with the Duplicate Finder?  I want to be sure I really understand this, while not completely inept, some functions do confuse me ( comes with old age and a late start in live with computing with computers) :)

 

Thanks!

 

RMB2

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  • 2 weeks later...

There's a bug in duplicate finder that essentially makes it useless.  It is unable to distinguish between multiple directory links ("hard links, NOT shortcuts or symlinks!) to the same file.  This shows up big time on a Win7 system with Cygwin installed, as the files in "bin" are hard links to the .exe's in another folder (usually something like "usr\i686-pc-cygwin\bin".  The same problem will show up many duplicates in \windows\system32, but CCleaner "thoughtfully" (not!) won't scan there.

 

Yup, dup finder finds duplicates all right, but they can point to the same exact data in a file system and deleting one of the "duplicates" will not affect the amount of storage used, but may break some software.  For those that want to experiment, take a look at the Command Prompt keyword "mklink".  The Cygwin command "ln" will create hard links while "ls -l" will show the link count to a given file.

 

There should be a CCleaner option to screen out hard links that point to the same-on disk bits.  Or, better yet, show in the report which are "duplicate" links to the same file versus actual duplicate files.

 

Cheers, -Tom

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Yep, use with caution - extreme caution.

In fact, don't use at all - the risks are higher than the benefits.

Backup now & backup often.
It's your digital life - protect it with a backup.
Three things are certain; Birth, Death and loss of data. You control the last.

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