Advanced

This tab of the Global Preferences window provides access to advanced Duplicate File Detective settings.

Performance

• Suppress retrieval of file ownership information - File ownership data is automatically retrieved from duplicate files for display within the duplicate report (upon search completion). Extraction of this information can slow duplicate search performance, especially when scanning remote (network) paths. If you don't care about file ownership, you may engage this switch to suppress its collection (file ownership fields will always be displayed as "unknown").
• Enable hard link tracking when comparing files - When enabled, Duplicate File Detective tracks NTFS hard links during comparison so that multiple links to the same physical file data are not reported as duplicates of one another. This requires additional file system queries, making scanning somewhat slower.
• Use low-priority disk I/O for scanning & hashing - When enabled, allows the operating system to prioritize other disk I/O requests over that of Duplicate File Detective. Requires re-start to take effect.
• Number of threads used during file content hashing and folder discovery operations - Choose between:
  • Single threaded - Recommended for limiting disk I/O impact.
  • Automatic / adaptive - Thread count is chosen based upon project and system analysis. Recommended for most users (the default).
  • Use this specific number of threads - Fixes the thread count to a value you specify (2-99).

Note: Incorrect use of thread-related settings can inhibit the general performance of your computer.

Tip: Multiple file content hashing threads are generally most effective at speeding up duplicate file comparison operations when the current project is configured to scan multiple, discrete volumes (e.g. paths spanning multiple physical disks or multiple network paths).

Miscellaneous

• Maximum preview window file size (in KB) - Files selected within the report detail view will be previewed only if their file size is less than what's defined here. Default value is 102,400 KB (100 MB).
• Enable Unicode support when creating zip archives - Allows for the creation of zip files that support Unicode file paths. Before engaging this option, be sure to confirm that any archive processing applications you might use to open these files also support Unicode.
• Add "Created by Duplicate File Detective" comment to shell shortcuts created by this tool - When enabled, shell shortcuts created by the link replacement feature carry an identifying comment, making them easy to recognize (and find) later.
• Apply NTFS compression to qualified export files - When enabled, this option causes supported text-based export file formats (HTML, CSV, and XML) to be deflated via NTFS compression.
• Specify temp folder - Can be used to override the default temp file folder location. By default, the user-defined temp directory will be used. To improve performance, use the fastest local storage media available (SSDs, etc.) for this purpose.
• Automatically retrieve missing metadata (image, music, document) for selected duplicate groups - When enabled, selecting a duplicate group in the results report automatically fetches any missing image, music, or document metadata for its files, so metadata-based report columns and the Compare Images pane populate on demand.