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Disk Explorer: Clone finder: How does it work?


bwitzed

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Posted

I have multitudes of duplicate files and am looking for a good program that will help me identify exact byte by byte duplicates and then help me delete them (through selection). How does the Clone finder in disk explorer work? I can't find anywhere to select that I want a byte by byte comparison rather than a title or other kind of comparisons. Can you tell me if it does it this way or if there is a way to tell it how I want it to find the duplicates?

 

Thanks.

Posted

Hi bwitzed

Try writing clone in "search" in menu-line and read the treads that come up.

Cheers

solbjerg

 

 

I have multitudes of duplicate files and am looking for a good program that will help me identify exact byte by byte duplicates and then help me delete them (through selection). How does the Clone finder in disk explorer work? I can't find anywhere to select that I want a byte by byte comparison rather than a title or other kind of comparisons. Can you tell me if it does it this way or if there is a way to tell it how I want it to find the duplicates?

 

Thanks.

Posted

Vista 64

 

I forgot to mention that my Operating System is Win Vista Ultimate 64. Does that make a difference in which clone/duplicate finder I use?

 

And I still don't understand the basis on which the Clone Finder searches for clones. I did run it on my data drive. Are you saying it is not to be trusted because it does not do a byte by byte comparison? (And if it doesn't, why doesn't it?)

 

Thanks.

Posted

Hi bwitzed

I think it does (what other criteria could it in fairness use)

BUT that doesn't mean that it is OK to delete all the clones.

If you have made a backup of your Operating System you will find many clones when you run the application. If you then delete them you will have thwarted the purpose of making a backup. If you do not delete the ones in the backup file but those in your Operating System you might end up with a computer that you cannot start.

The clone finder should be seen as a tool for information.

But some clones it will be ok to delete, for example duplicate files that you do not need in all the locations you have it.

Usually though most of them are quite small, so you will not reclaim very much space by deleting them. But perhaps picture files or video files in too many locations could yield some reclaimed space.

Let us say that you have two computers in different rooms, then you wouldn't throw out the keyboard for one of them just because you had another keyboard at the other, would you?

Hopefully though it doesn't delete the last copy of the files, clone finders usually don't.

Cheers

solbjerg

p.s. It of course also checks the name - small differences it usually accepts both in name and bytes, but larger differences it does not, it sees those as different files, (actually they are - even if they originally were the same file)

I made a test of this, so there is a post somewhere with the results I found then. You can try finding it.

I think there is a link to it in Usage of IObit Products (links in my signature)

 

 

I forgot to mention that my Operating System is Win Vista Ultimate 64. Does that make a difference in which clone/duplicate finder I use?

 

And I still don't understand the basis on which the Clone Finder searches for clones. I did run it on my data drive. Are you saying it is not to be trusted because it does not do a byte by byte comparison? (And if it doesn't, why doesn't it?)

 

Thanks.

Posted

There are several methods of clones

 

and it looked to me that this one does it by name of file. Byte by byte is the most detailed but there is also another method of cluster checking. Can anyone in the programming department tell me what this program an ASC actually does and if there are any plans to let the user decide what method to use and have other option choices.

Posted

Hi bwitzed

The program tells you the name of the clones, where they are located and what size they have. Isn't that sufficient?

You could do a test

Find a file - copy it - rename it - copy it - rename it - and place it at different locations and then see if it will show up as a clone.

Cheers

solbjerg

 

 

and it looked to me that this one does it by name of file. Byte by byte is the most detailed but there is also another method of cluster checking. Can anyone in the programming department tell me what this program an ASC actually does and if there are any plans to let the user decide what method to use and have other option choices.
Posted

Comparison by filename and size vs. byte by byte comparison

 

No, comparison by filename and size is completely insufficient. I want to know that the file is an EXACT duplicate and not that it just appears to be the same. That isn't the same thing at all. A byte by byte comparison can tell you if a file, albeit be of a different name and/or different size, is really the same file as another. My problem is that my harddrive was wiped out and the data restored but not the tree and not the file names and the process also created duplicates that may be the same in essence but may vary in file size. Byte by byte comparison is the only way to go. And I don't see why ASC doesn't do that. I'll go put that in as a suggestion.

 

In the meantime, can anyone suggest to me which program would suit my purposes best given that I am running Vista Ultimate 64? I have several programs that I liked in XP but I don't know that they transfer over into Vista, esp. 64 for use on my AMD 64.

Posted

Comparison types

 

Forgive my two cents as a newcomer to the forum (but I've been around elsewhere, longer!). There are two reasons for doing a duplicate search. First, you may want to find files that have been copied to other folders, perhaps as backups, and are no longer needed. Second, you may want to find two files that have the same content, even if they have different names.

 

The first type of duplicate search is the simplest, as it doesn't even involve looking into the file itself. I obviously don't know the programming inside ASC, but many programs simply look at the file tables. If two files have the same name (less the path), last modification time, and size (to the byte), the program calls them duplicates.

 

Let's say I create two short text files in two folders within the same minute, and I give them the same name:

 

C:\Folder1\Sentence.txt

"This is sentence one."

 

C:\Folder2\Sentence.txt

"This is sentence two."

 

The files have the same name, same creation and modification times (to the minute), and same size (23 bytes, in this case). Obviously, though, the contents are not the same, but many duplicate-search programs would consider them duplicates.

 

I think bwitzed wants the second type of comparison - comparing contents. I sympathize, because I'm still trying to recover from a crash where I got a few thousand recovered files, all in one folder, named Lost0001, Lost0002, etc. Obviously, I can't compare names or times against anything I have from backup. Either I have to open each file and figure out what it was, or get a comparison program that reads all files at the byte (or, on similar hard drives, sector or cluster) level, creates a checksum (or some other identifier), puts those in a table, matches identifiers, and then compares the files for confirmation. This is not at all a trivial process and I doubt that ASC does it. Unfortunately, bwitzed, I don't know off the top of my head a program that does, but do know that they exist. Good luck!

 

Oh, yes - one clarification, bwitzed. You say,

"A byte by byte comparison can tell you if a file, albeit be of a different name and/or different size, is really the same file as another."
If the files are, in fact, different sizes, I don't think a byte-by-byte comparison could ever show them to have identical contents. Of course, that opens up the whole issue of comparison type three, where you strip out excess bytes from corrupted files (all non-ASCII bytes, for example), compare what's left, and determine against some predetermined threshold whether the files can be considered "identical". I think that's a little beyond the scope of this discussion, however! ;-)
Posted

Other duplicate finder programs

 

There are actually some very good duplicate finder programs and I don't know why they find duplicate files of different sizes but they do. The only thing I am wondering is what works with Vista, especially 64 Ultimate.

 

Here are some good XP programs:

clone finder

Duplicate finder

 

Go to http://www.snapfiles.com for good programs (choose free and sort by category and rating.)

  • 9 months later...
Posted

Hi everyone

Please read about cloned/duplicate files finders in the forum, lots of posts about it! (write clone in Search)

Use any of those programs with caution!!!!

Described also in Usage of IObit Products in the Lounge section

Cheers

solbjerg

 

 

There are actually some very good duplicate finder programs and I don't know why they find duplicate files of different sizes but they do. The only thing I am wondering is what works with Vista, especially 64 Ultimate.

 

Here are some good XP programs:

clone finder

Duplicate finder

 

Go to www.snapfiles.com for good programs (choose free and sort by category and rating.)

Posted
Hi bwitzed

I think it does (what other criteria could it in fairness use)

BUT that doesn't mean that it is OK to delete all the clones.

If you have made a backup of your Operating System you will find many clones when you run the application. If you then delete them you will have thwarted the purpose of making a backup. If you do not delete the ones in the backup file but those in your Operating System you might end up with a computer that you cannot start.

The clone finder should be seen as a tool for information.

But some clones it will be ok to delete, for example duplicate files that you do not need in all the locations you have it.

Usually though most of them are quite small, so you will not reclaim very much space by deleting them. But perhaps picture files or video files in too many locations could yield some reclaimed space.

Let us say that you have two computers in different rooms, then you wouldn't throw out the keyboard for one of them just because you had another keyboard at the other, would you?

Hopefully though it doesn't delete the last copy of the files, clone finders usually don't.

Cheers

solbjerg

Hi my friend solbjerg always gives the best advice. You dxxx sure better have your OS backed up if your going to mess around with duplicate files. I found it best to leave them alone. You can delete some if you really know what your doing, but if you think you are going to gain a lot of free space. I doubt it. I like this program. I really hate recommending it as it can cost you a lot of misery if you don't know what your doing. In the screen prints you can see you could probable get rid of one and be just fine. IMHO you are messing with fire. ----garybear

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