If you’re one of the remaining Vista users, I’m sure you’re familiar with Windows desktop search on Vista. It is the most common way you’ll search for files that you haven’t been able to find on your own. It can find the files from the past couple of days or even past couple of years. But what happens if suddenly your Windows Vista desktop search stops working?
Need to make more detailed searches? A Vista-compatible search tool might be what you need.
The indexing on Windows Vista can run into problems – it’s an old system and Microsoft support for Vista is nearing it’s end. Often your best bet for solving search issues is to rebuild your entire index. Before trying to rebuild the index, make sure you know exactly how to properly search for a file on your computer.
How to use Windows Vista desktop search
To start a search on the desktop just click on the start button in the bottom left hand side of the screen, and then type what you’re looking for into the box that’s called Start Search. Now you have to choose either to Search the Internet or See All Results.
When the search window is open, you can actually choose from a few different options to help narrow down your search. You can choose a specific location to search through, a particular type of item, and you can apply several different search parameters.
This can really help narrow your search down to the item you need. When Windows Vista search stops working, however, no matter which options you choose, your search will come up empty. Rebuilding the Windows Vista Index is the easiest way to ensure that your desktop search gets back up and running asap.
Rebuild the index on Windows Vista
You should know before starting the rebuilding process that the speed at which this gets done will be heavily dependent on the speed of your computer’s processor. The slower the processor, the more time it will take to rebuild the index on Windows Vista, but it is worth the wait, as it is the best fix for most Windows Vista search problems. To rebuild the index, follow these steps:
- Go to the Start Menu search box and type in Indexing. This will show something that says Indexing Options.
- Open the Indexing Options and in the dialog box, click on the Advanced
- In the Advanced Options click the button that says Rebuild. This is going to wipe out your index, and build a completely new one.
This may also take a long time if there are a lot of files to get through, so you should leave your computer running and rebuilding the index overnight. Once the rebuild is done, it should have solved all of your Windows Vista search problems.
Image via TechMynd
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