DigitalVolcano Software Support

Hi All

I've been using Duplicate Cleaner to clear up my photo archive which runs back to 2003. There were far more duplicates that I expected ! The archive is stored at E:\users\Jeff\photos ( for example ). I'll refer to this as the archive below.

I now have another small problem.

I have a number of backup CDROMS/DVD/external harddrives and I need to establish that all photos on these external media are also stored in the now sorted archive. Obviously anything not in the archive needs to be copied over.

I'm trying to find a way that duplicate cleaner can help but i'm stuck...

I can simply add the new external device and the sorted archive in the search list and I'll end up with a list of duplicates that feature in both media but what I need is a list of files on the external device which DO NOT feature in the archive.

any ideas ?

In fact I'm asking for a 'Single Item Spotter'.....

It would also be great to be able to only classify a duplicate between media/paths ie switch off duplicates within the same path. I could ignore duplicates within the archive and only concern myself with matches between external media and the archive.

Thanks again and really enjoying the product.

Jeff

Is your goal to have all files individually (only one unique copy of them) in one large archive (like one directory) or are the shoots ordered by (folders containing unique) date(s)?

I think a simple Directory Comparison tool could tell you which file "is already there" in the archive and which files are only on CD (or only in the archive, but if, these would mount up to a large number I guess).

You could then just copy the files, that is, if their names and dates are just the same. If your problem is that the names may have changed, then yes, you would have to search and match them by contents.

If all the files were uniquely named, you could get a file name list of all your external device backups & compare that against to your E: archive.

If E: has everything, I would simply back it up to another HDD or external HDD, & just keep the rest of your backup medias as an extra precaution.

Thinking that trying to ascertain what may or may not be backed up elsewhere & in particular in multiple ways & against multiple devices is going to be difficult.

I believe there was a RFE for a feature like that already.
There may be other softwares to do something like that?

There are other dup finders that will compare one pool of files against another (without comparing each pool against itself) but I'm not sure if it will present meaningful data to you, because it would be searching for DUPs where you are really looking for not-DUPS.

So in that respect, a directory sync or comparison program that would allow you to compare your E: against a group (pool) of other drives/devices (so a one to many rather then just one to one) is likely the way to go.