duplicate, duplicate, triplicate, facedesk...

[The VCR King]

I have a large iTunes library. About 2500 songs between purchases and CD rips. I have had to restore my computer before, which means moving the original files from "windows.old" to the new user folders that I just made. Let's go and install, itunes shall we? And now, itunes wants to re-download my whole music library. Congratulations, I'm now stuck with 2500+ duplicate files. And no matter how many times I uncheck them, my itunes still chooses to sync them to my iPod. Thats nearly 5GB of space wasted for no reason. This is really getting old fast and I DO NOT WANT TO SIT HERE FOR HOURS AND HOURS WEEDING THROUGH 2000 FILES AND *delete *delete *delete *delete...! How can I just kill all the duplicates at once and get this stupidness over with?!

Thanks.

 

[Geoff]

Do the duplicates have the same name? Can you sort them by date created if the duplicates were all created at once?

Usually just copying and restoring the iTunes folder under music is all you need to do.

 

[johnnyb58]

Depending on what OS you are using there are programs that compare files without regard to name and list them.

Although I have never used this one and cannot vouch for it, it is one of many.

http://download.cnet.com/File-Comparator/3000-2248_4-10404407.html

 

[beers]

If it's your same library then just dump the old files. Sort by date (as stated above) using detailed view, highlight a range, done.

How can I just kill all the duplicates at once and get this stupidness over with?!

Additional stupidity awaits you either way my friend.