dotTech

Eh, I have never had anything against registry cleaners even though many people preach against them and how 'dangerous' they are. Duplicate File finders, however, I completely dislike. Just by the nature of the task these programs are doomed to fail. Duplicate files are often made on purpose in temporary folders, or for backups; Programs often have different language localizations that contain the same files as the other localizations. With the ever increasing hard drive size, duplicate file finders are just something I would stay away from. Anyway, onto the review:

Registration and installation went fine. The program is very easy to use and it really does scan your computer very quickly. With the ability to exclude system and temp files, it adds nice functionality to what would otherwise be a worse mess then it is already.

This program sort of works like a task 'wizard'. You just follow on screen instructions step by step. This is what the program window looks like when you are open the program :

As I mentioned just following the on screen instructions will get you through this program; however for consistency's sake, and because I would like to make a few comments along the way, I will do the usual step by step walkthrough w/ commentry. Hit "Next" please. You will be brought to step 2:

Hit "Add one..." to add locations to scan for duplicate files. You can add individual folders (such as your Downloads folder) or your can add whole drives/partitions (such as your C:/ drive). You can also add multiple locations to search; however if you had multiple locations to search that overlap, like C:/Users/Lakjin then C:/Users/Lakjin/Downloads, the program will give you an error telling you that you cannot add both because they overlap, or something to that effect. After you have added all your locations to search, hit "Next". You will be brought to step 3:

I highly suggest that you check "Exclude System Files..." and "Exclude temp files...". Checking exclude system files will ensure that you don't accidentally delete important system (windows) files. However don't let this give you a false sense of security because you can screw up your computer just as bad if you remove important files for other programs, such as your antivirus. Checking exclude temp files will help prevent you from receiving more junk results then what you will get already. Many programs make temporary copies of certain files and place them in the temp folder - I see no need for you to go scavenging it to clean it out. Leaving process empty files checked is up to you.

If you click on "Filter", you will be able to set certain limits on what files will be detected by this program based on file size:

Hit "OK" when you are done. Once you are done with all the settings, hit "Next". This will bring you to step 4:

Just hit "Scan" and relax. You will be able to monitor the scan progress:

You can stop/cancel or pause it at any time. The scanning is pretty quick and you should be done in a blink of an eye. After the scanning is finished you will automatically be taken to step 5 where you will be able to view your results:

Keep in mind that you can always hit "Scan Again" and you will be brought back to step 1 allowing you to start the whole process over again. Anyway, for now, hit "Show Results". This will show you your results and allow you to pick and choose which ones to delete:

Buttons explained:

- this will delete all the files that you have selected.

- this will remove the files from the 'identical files' list but not from your hard drive.

- this will open the folder that the file is located in.

- selecting a file and hitting 'Execute' is the same exact thing as opening the folder, and double clicking on that file.

Note that there is no backup or restore feature, like the ones you would find in WinUtilities or Advanced SystemCare, with this program. Whatever you delete is sent directly to the recycle bin - if you screw up, you had better hope you have not emptied out your recycle bin because you will not be able to restore the files with Clone Terminator.

As you can see the list, on my computer at least, is astronomical. The results that I got with this program is precisely the reason my opening paragraph to this post was condemning duplicate file finders - there are very few results that are actually useful, such as the first two results that are showing me I have two of the same install files. Most of the results are what I call 'junk' results - files that are of the same program but for different language localizations, backup files etc. The program also detects files (such as Readme files or little flag image files) of two different programs as duplicates. The list is so huge, is it really worth looking through that many files so that I can get what a maximum of maybe 100 MB? Okay lets say 1 GB to be optimistic. Not to mention the risk involved if I delete files that are important to the programs on my computer. I am telling you, I very much dislike duplicate file finders - I did not delete any files that were found by this program.

This program is also inconsistent in its scan results. I ran 6 scans one after one (clicking on "Scan Again" after each scan was finished). These were how many duplicate files were found, with the arrows indicting a new scan:

939 -> 1007 -> 1170 -> 1285 > 838 -> 912

As you can see, not once did the program find the same amount of duplicate files then the scan previous to it even though I made no changes to my computer what so ever. And just for reference, all the settings were the same for all the scans meaning that exclude system files and exclude temp files was checked.

Lastly, the developer needs to add the ability to search for a certain file type duplicate, like for example, .exe files.

So...ya. Overall, this program is nice and fast, but it still suffers from the duplicate file finder program curse - not being very useful.

Free Alternatives:

Clonespy

Clonespy is a duplicate file finder that technically does not support Vista, but it works on Vista anyway. The thing I liked about Clonespy was that it displayed the results one at a time so you can easily view if the results were actually duplicates or not. However, the scan accuracy was not much better the Clone Terminators.

Duplicate Cleaner

Duplicate cleaner is a tool to assist anyone in cleaning up the contents of their personal hard drive or corporate network. You'd be surprised just how many redundant or duplicate files you could find forgotten in an obscure documents folder. Photos, music, Word documents, PowerPoint presentations, videos - you name it, if it appears twice on your computer then Duplicate Cleaner will find it.

-Developer

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Duplicate cleaner was very, very slow. I canceled it while it was at 1.2% scanning - yes it was that slow. However I have no doubt it won't be any better then the rest of the programs.

These free programs have a feature that will display duplicate files:

Glary Utilities

Under "Files & Folders" there is "Duplicate File Finder"

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While Glary Utilities duplicate file finder allows you to specify what type of file you are looking for, it is not very accurate either - it displays too less results. I know for a fact that I have many .exe install files that are the same sitting in my download folder but Glary did not detect them.

Advanced SystemCare Free (or Pro)

Under "Utilities" -> "Admin Tools" there is "Disk Explorer". In that there is a option to view duplicate files.

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The duplicate file finder in disk explorer in Advanced SystemCare is even worse then Clone Terminator - it displays all duplicate files on your computer from system files to installation files. Again not very useful.

WinUtilities, while not free, also had a "Duplicate File Finder". Samething with WinUtilities as the rest - not useful, too much junk results.

PMnet Verdict: There really is not much to say. This program displayed less useful results and more useless ones. This program can be potentially dangerous to the technically less-advanced people who will be duped into deleting important files. I would never tell anyone to touch this program but since it is without a backup or restore feature, I double that recommendation to stay away. As for alternatives, I wouldn't recommend any either. Duplicate file finders just by definition are doomed to fail - many times duplicates of files are made on purpose, either for app use, or backup, or whatever. You just can't get around it. It really is not worth the time and the risk to be able to get a minimal amount of hard drive space back.

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