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Help / Samples / Find duplicate samples

Find duplicate samples

Find copies of samples that are byte-for-byte identical. Remove extra copies that Collect All left behind.

Steps

  1. Open “Find duplicates” from the Samples tab.
  2. Press “Find duplicates”. Nearfield looks through your samples. The look runs in the background and removes nothing.
  3. Under “Remove the extra copies”, tick each project, or press “Select all”. Nothing is ticked at first.
  4. Press the Remove button. It says how many copies it removes. A confirm, “Keep one copy, in your Library”, names each project and its count.
  5. Press the Remove button in the confirm to continue, or “Cancel”.

What Find duplicates never removes

  • It never removes a file from your Library.
  • It never removes an Ableton Set.
  • It leaves a copy alone if a Set in the project still uses it, or if the project is shared.
  • Live's automatic Backup Sets do not count as a Set here.

What it can remove

The tool can remove only one thing: a copy that Collect All left inside a project folder, when an identical twin sits in your User Library.

Undo

After the removal, press “Undo — put these copies back” to put the copies back.

Read the guide Collect All and Save for why the copies are there.