The System Scan

This mode is for scanning folders/ hard drives/ external drives/ USBs or even networked locations. The whole process gets accomplished in 3 steps, namely selecting the target location, choosing the scan mode, and then launching the scan.

We’ve laid out the functionality of our duplicate picture finder in the following lines. Let’s look at the goodness provided by PictureEcho.

Click the Add Path button to easily add as many locations as you want for a single scan, and PictureEcho will happily take care of the rest. If you’ve mistakenly added a directory, just select it in the address box which is showing all the locations that have been lined up for the scan, and click Remove Path.

Next, you have to choose whether you want to scan for exact duplicates or similar ones. Exact duplicates are pictures that match each other bit by bit, pixel by pixel. Similar images are those images which even the naked eye can detect to closely resemble each other, but not close enough to be classified as exact duplicates.

If you’re going for the Similar Match scan, click the Similarity Settings link to open up the Settings window where you can select the scan of your choice. Basically, the similar photos scan is of 4 types, and the following image explains each of them in a very easy-to-understand manner. Choose the scan type of your choice and click OK.

The Included Extensions tab shows the image types that will be scanned in both the Exact Match as well as Similar Match scenarios. Please note that as of now, raw images can only be scanned in the Exact Match mode of the duplicate photo finder for Windows 11.

The Excluded Folders tab shows locations that have been omitted by default from all scans. These locations include critical directories which must not be scanned, or you run the risk of critically damaging Windows files.

Now back to the action, you can select the Show Preview checkbox if you want to view the preview of an image that has been detected in the scan. Finally, click Start Search to launch the scan.

When the scan is over, all the duplicates/ similar images will be listed out in a group format. The important point to note over here is that each group comprises of the same/ similar (as the case may be) kind of images corresponding to a single image. You can click any image and the Preview Area will bring up its preview and also provide useful metadata information about the image.

The footer of the PictureEcho user interface will be relaying handy info on the results compiled by the scan.

Now you can either manually select the images which you wish to delete/backup to a folder by clicking the checkbox before each image’s name or use the Select Duplicates menu (far-right corner of the footer). The Select Duplicates menu is a much faster and easier option. It provides you a 1-stop solution, where you can select the images at a single click, rather than selecting every single photo individually.

The only option that requires a little detailing is the Select by image locations one. If you’ve scanned several folders in a single scan, you can use this option if you want images in a particular folder to be left untouched. Simply click the Select by image locations option and then use the Add button to add the folder which shan’t be subjected to picture deletion/move to folder action. Once the folder has been added, select it and click Unmark. As a result of this action, all the picture-files in Test Folder 3 (see the image below) won’t be touched, and the images in the remaining scan location(s) that are the exact/ similar match to the images in Test Folder 3 will now be automatically selected for the next action.

The final step is to click the Select Action button and make your choice. The Permanent Delete option will purge the photo files after getting your consent. If you select the Move to Folder option, you will get the Browse for Folder pop up which will help you select the folder to which you want to move the pictures.

The procedure for the Similar Match scan will be the exact same, with the only exception being that the Similar Match option and the Similarity Level will have to be selected before the scan.

The Adobe Lightroom Duplicate Scan

PictureEcho provides a special scan mode for helping users scan their Adobe Lightroom catalog for exact/similar photos. The procedure is almost entirely the same as the system scan, except the beginning.

Once the user has created the catalog in Adobe Lightroom, the catalog location will automatically be added to the address box when the user selects the Adobe Lightroom tab.

The History

This section provides a very neat feature to the user. You can use it to view a summary of all the scans performed in the past, as well as restore data for all scans in which the Move to Folder action was performed.