Help on removing duplicates from complete romsets

[nixzero]

I'm looking for a way to remove multiple versions of the same ROM from complete romsets. Most of my sets are goodtools verified complete, and it's great to know I'm not missing anything, but I find I often have several versions of the same title, which just takes up space and makes for messy/tedious scrolling when I load them in an emulator. I've talked to other modders who usually resort to cleaning their romsets manually if they can't find an ideal set online.

To get rid of multiples, I usually bulk rename the [!] to a string of characters, search for the string, then copy the results to my device. BUT, not all romsets use [!] to designate the "best" ROM (my PCE set does not). It's pretty sloppy. In addition, it would be nice to have all US roms, then EU exclusives, then JPN exclusives. Again, i know a lot of people who set their roms up this way, but it always involves manually deleting ROMs one by one.

I'm hoping there are some tools or methods that I can use to do this. Any help is appreciated!

 

[cearp]

i guess you could just rip all your games again, this time making sure not to rip the same one more than once

 

[nixzero]

Yeah, but that would take even longer, I'm trying to save time.

 

[cearp]

i have never used rom organizers etc, but... they do not let you manage the files?... as in, 'move' all the verified ones to a different directory?
there is just the .dat which specifies the database of roms right... and you can use that with any rom organizer? (that is what i was under the impression of, maybe i'm wrong)
surely there must be a program that can do that...

 

[nixzero]

Phew, almost forgot about this thread. I had used GoodTools to verify roms, but had never heard of ROM organizers before, and they look to be exactly what I need. I knew Mame32 organizes games in such a way to eliminate clones, only makes sense that there would be other programs that work the same way for other rom collections. You pointed me in the right direction, now I just need to Google around to find the best ones for what I'm trying to do.