PM Adding Letter A to File Name

[rbsandor]

Mac OS 10.9.2 and PM V 5 Build 15011
Today, PM started duplicating and adding the letter A to each file ingested. I haven't made any changes to the ingest dialog and wonder how I can eliminate this duplication. The files are Olympus Raws taken with and E-M1. Thanks, Richard

[Kirk Baker]

Richard,

Mac OS 10.9.2 and PM V 5 Build 15011
Today, PM started duplicating and adding the letter A to each file ingested. I haven't made any changes to the ingest dialog and wonder how I can eliminate this duplication. The files are Olympus Raws taken with and E-M1.

Are you formatting your card each time you put it into your camera?  If not, are you using Incremental Ingest?  If you're not re-formatting and you're not using Incremental Ingest, then your images will get duplicated over and over again each time you ingest your card.

-Kirk

P.S. Your version of Photo Mechanic is very much out of date.  I suggest that all PM5 users upgrade to the latest build: 15451.

[Hayo Baan]

Hi Richard,

If PM is adding the letter A to your files, you are (inadvertently?) ingesting duplicates. There are a couple of potential reasons for this:
1. You are ingesting the same memory card twice without having “incremental ingest” .
2. You do have “incremental ingest” set, but you somehow deleted the small files PM uses to determine where you left off ingesting.
3. You have simply run out of unique file names; if you do not rename the camera files, once it reaches number 9999, the camera will restart at 0000. But even if you rename, you must make sure the file names are truly unique. PM will never overwrite files, but will append a letter (or digit, depending on your preferences) if there is a conflict.

Hope this helps,
Hayo

[rbsandor]

Kirk and Hayo: thanks for your responses. I just discovered the cause of the problem. I was downloading to 2 external hard drives. I really should have much had more coffee before choosing the file paths as I chose the same external drive for both primary and secondary. Sorry to have wasted your time. Please send head slap via email. Richard