Do I have to delete jpeg sidecar?

[mapgirl]

I shoot in raw. But somehow the setting was changed (bad elves, I think) to raw + jpeg some months back! I've found several long, involved instructions on how to get rid of the jpeg sidecar. But my question is: do I have to? There just seem like so many ways doing this could go terribly wrong (I use Lightroom 4.3 and am not all that skilled at things above my pay-grade). All my photos are now in a VERY large external hard drive, so space isn't a problem.
1. Is there a simple, safe way to get rid of the jpeg sidecars?
2. Does having them affect my end-product?

Thanks!
And, yes, I've reset my camera to shoot just raw.

[OsmosisStudios]

They're not sidecars: they're separate files. Your best bet, afaik, is to just manually go in and find them, and delete them. I don't use Lightroom's library system, but if it's anything like Bridge (likely), it just shows what it finds and if they're not there, they wont show up.

[ZafarSami]

My Lightroom 4 (on Windows 7) displays just one image of each RAW plus JPEG pair, the RAW one. If you delete from Lightroom it will delete both. Ask me how I know :|

It is better to go in explorer (or finder in Mac) and set a filter for jpeg and delete from there..

[OsmosisStudios]

It is better to go in explorer (or finder in Mac) and set a filter for jpeg and delete from there..

Which is what I said...

[sk66]

My Lightroom 4 (on Windows 7) displays just one image of each RAW plus JPEG pair, the RAW one. If you delete from Lightroom it will delete both. Ask me how I know :|

There are two LR preferences that can cause this. One is under import...there is an option to "treat Jpegs next to raw files as separate images" which is unselected by default. The other is under external editing where there is an option to "stack with original" upon returning to LR which is selected by default.

[ZafarSami]

There are two LR preferences that can cause this. One is under import...there is an option to "treat Jpegs next to raw files as separate images" which is unselected by default. The other is under external editing where there is an option to "stack with original" upon returning to LR which is selected by default.

Thanks Steve. As I now shoot only RAW, I wouldn't have to worry about the first. In the second case, the film strip in develop mode shows a symbol for stacks, right?

[sk66]

Thanks Steve. As I now shoot only RAW, I wouldn't have to worry about the first. In the second case, the film strip in develop mode shows a symbol for stacks, right?

yes, and selecting the stack will unstack them. And then you can deal with them individually.

[dasmith232]

I agree with the discussion above about dealing with "stacked" files, and also how to manage these files without the program "helping". Back to the original question, there may be another topic (or not?).

There are JPG files, and there are "sidecar" files (XMP), and they're not the same thing.

Sidecar files are (in Adobe's usage) small, meta-data files that go along with the original image. They're not big; the big files are left in their original form. Lightroom is not shy about advertising they're (good) philosophy of not modifying the original image (RAW or JPG), but to have the modifications kept as "instructions" in a sidecar file.

[mapgirl]

Thank you all for your responses! As suggested, I was able to see the jpegs separate from the raw files in Explorer and delete them there. It just will take awhile.

[ZafarSami]

Thanks Dave.

Am I correct in assuming that Lightroom saves changes in xmp files till you decide to save metadata or to copy changes from before to after, and then the info is saved in the RAW file?