Full guide: How to Perform Synology Deduplication

Synology overview

Network-attached storage (NAS) is becoming increasingly popular in today's tech landscape. Synology holds a prominent position in the realm of NAS devices and used by millions of users.

Just like with other forms of data storage, such as your computer's local storage, external drives, and cloud storage, duplicate files can accumulate on your NAS drives over time. To optimize space and enhance file management, it's a good idea to execute Synology deduplication to free up your Synology NAS.

What is Data deduplication?

Data deduplication is a powerful technique that enables you to maximize storage space and improve storage efficiency, particularly in virtualized environments. Working at the block level, it identifies and eliminates duplicate data blocks, retaining only the unique ones. This process significantly reduces storage space needs without compromising the integrity of your data.

Steps: Find duplicate files on Sinology NAS with Storage Analyzer

Storage analyzer is a built-in tool of Synology to execute sinology file deduplication. Here is how you can do it:

Step 1. In Synology DiskStation Manager, go to Package Center.

Step 2. Search for Storage Analyzer, then install it and open it.

Step 3. Choose Create in the Report Profile section. Please name your task, such as Duplicates. Click Next.

Step 4. In the Select Report Items list, select the Potential Duplicate Files checkbox. Click Next.

Step 5. Indicate the folders in which you wish to search for duplicate files. Once you've made your selections, proceed by clicking Next.

Step 6. Confirm your selections which based on your need, then choose Next.

Step 7. In the Summary dialog, select the Generate Reports Now checkbox. Click Done.

Once the identification process is complete, proceed to inspect the generated report. You'll find a comprehensive list of duplicate files detected on your Synology NAS. Take the time to review each set of duplicate files patiently, and manually eliminate the redundant ones to perform Sinology deduplication.

Suggestion: backup important data on your devices

It clears out your storage space to make Synology data deduplication. However, everyone cannot guarantee they won’t clear out the important data. Additionally, if you have diverse needs for data backup on various devices, like QNAP NAS incremental backup or scheduled NAS backup, you should use professional and reliable backup and restore software, AOMEI Backupper Standard is a case in point.

More distinguished advantages are listed as follow:

▶Auto backup: Its scheduled backup feature enables you backup your data in daily/ weekly/ monthly/ event-trigger and USB plug-in mode.
▶Multiple storage locations: This tool is a complete backup and restore program running on all Windows PCs, enables you to select internal/external hard drive, USB, cloud drive, NAS, etc. as source or destination.
▶Flexible backup scheme: It offers 3 kinds of backup modes, in the advanced version, its incremental and differential backup can eliminate duplicates, which will largely save your storage space. Also, if you enable the auto clean-up option, this tool will auto delete old backups for you.

Then I will show you how to use this software to backup your data, for example, Synology files. Before you start, please download this software.

Step 1. Launch this software and choose Backup File Backup.

Step 2. Then Add Folder or Add File to select the source data.

Step 3. Specify a destination path to save your backup images.

✿Tip: You can backup your files to AOMEI Cloud once you sign up for your AOMEI account. It will offer you 1TB of free storage space for 15 days.

Step 4. Click Start Backup to start.

To sum up

Making Sinology deduplication is always a wise choice to free up your Synology NAS. However, I sincerely suggest you backup your important data on your Synology NAS for every operation has its potential risks leading to data loss. AOMEI Backupper is the top-rank backup and restore software that enables you backup everything you want, greatly enhancing your data safety. Now don’t hesitate, download it and have a try！