Is there any way of getting the old Windows XP Search functionality in Vista?

Anonymous
2009-04-16T12:21:43+00:00

I find the Windows Vista search program to be absolutely horrible.  I just want to click Start, then Search (or Winkey-F), and then just choose the drive I want to search or enter a path to search.  Or, just right-click on a folder and have Search in the context menu.  Now I have to browse to the folder or drive, type in my search term, then I can actually get to some search options, after clicking search tools, then advanced search, then check the box to include hidden locations just to get to what would be the beginning search options screen in Windows XP.  This is annoying.

Then as it is giving me my 1000 or so results, I cannot just browse through them as they come up.  You see, as I am reading the results, it is inserting results above where I just read.  Because of this, it is pointless to browse the results until after it has finished searching.  I do not need this to sort on the fly. 

Suppose I am missing a column, such as file size or date.  If I add those columns, it starts the search over!  Powerful and Robust?  Maybe.  However, Microsoft should have considered ease of use when they designed it.

I am an IT Manager and usually would have no problems trying to work with new programs.  I have been running Vista for about 1 year.  This is not a transition like going to the Ribbon in Office 2007, where I hate it at first, then I learn to love it and never want to go back.  There is not much love coming from Vista Search.

So, does anyone know how to get the old search tool into Vista, or somehow get Vista search to behave like XP?

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Files, folders, and storage

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Anonymous
2009-06-29T16:57:31+00:00

Even the search capabilities of XP are horrible and unfortunately it has been carried over in Vista and W7.  One of the better solutions I have found for your problem and which also works in Vista and W7 is comething called Agent Ransack. ( http://www.mythicsoft.com/agentransack/ ) It is a free file search utility. I have used it for 2 years and it does exactly what MS removed when XP came out.  I posted the following about this in the W7 forums with any useful reply. 

Hope that will help you out.

From my Win7 forum post.

I am running the RC version of Windows 7 and have unfortunately found no solution to the problems which started in XP and apparently have made their way into W7, at least I have not been able to find it.

Prior to XP one was able to search for text in ANY file type in any directory.  For some, as yet unexplained reason the search functionality in XP was arbitrarily limited to include only known document types such as doc, xls, html etc. There was a convoluted "solution" posted on MS's website to circumvent this major issue but even it did not work as advertised.  Luckily there were some people annoyed enough by this hi-handed change who took it upon themselves to develop something to do just that.  FindinFiles and Agent Ransack come to mind.

What is it about MS that makes them ignore the requests from MANY users over the years for a return of this feature.  Do people constantly have to develop new mousetraps for every MS OS because MS figures we do not deserve these features?

I develop software and if I want to look for text inside files in a directory or on an entire hard drive, regardless of file extension, then that should be MY prerogative and I should be able to do so.  It should be a basic functionality of ANY OS. Please give us that functionality back in W7

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Anonymous
2009-04-16T21:06:56+00:00

HomerTNachoCheese,

    There is not any way to customize the default search capabilities in Vista to make it look like XP.  There may be some 3rd party software that looks and functions like the XP search but none I can recommend.  Below is a link to Windows Search 4.0.  You may want to give it a try and see if you like the functionality a little more.

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  1. Anonymous
    2010-04-13T04:49:57+00:00

    microsoft is part of the plan of grand deceive and they trying to pis u off with depriveing you the basic windows features, same as microsoft pures milion of dollars to vaccinate poor africans with letal poison instad of giving them food and shelter or jobs... They are one big ____, dont read this if u wanna sleep

    xeeatwelve...net

    What does that cultic junk have to do with MS?

    Hi Teen Geek,

    It has nothing what so ever as far as I can see. But I will say, if I had to find it on my computer, it would be a major project if I didn't already know what it said or where it was located. I agree with those before me. The search feature leaves much to be desired.

    I have a couple of suggestions for Microsoft. I hope I'm not stepping on toes. I am an intermediate computer user, and I don't know how to program, but as a user I can see flaws. When you changed the search feature in Vista you should have left all of the specific filters clearly, in the search. When you develop 8 or whatever you tag it, could you put in, but not restricted to, the date, size, name, keyword, author, owner, include hidden, and JUST hidden files, filters. I have found files that were placed on my computer that did not belong, by including hidden files, but had to plow through alot of ligit files to find those that were hidden, but weren't mark as such in the search pane. I wouldn't necessarily know the date or size of such a file, but most of that type will be hidden. there seems to be certain keywords in them that appear when I experience problems with my pc. One is the phrase 'Don't pretty the path' or the word 'dirty' the y is with the two dots above it. The others that I can't think of at this time. Another feature is the date and user that last used a file listed in the file properties, and don't have it change until you exit. For one who is supposed to be the only one on a pc, it would be nice to know who and when without running a tracking program. That way it could be seen if your id is being used, or if someone is using their own id and it's not showing up anywhere else. It should be a system feature, greyed out even to admin so that it cannot be changed and would trip up anyone perpetrating. The regedit is a massive project for those of us who try to truly manage their pc's. I wonder if there is a way to mark the individual entries simpler for what program each thing belongs to without having to research id's six ways to eternity to validate an entry. It would be so much easier if I could determine if the entry should even be there, let alone if it should be enabled or disabled. I sometimes know what needs to be done,but cannot find where to turn it on or off due to so many sections and entries even using search. Example: I had McAfee and somehow it and other protection programs were turned off and unresponsive and couldn't get online to reload or repair. If I could have found the correct places in the registry I could have corrected the problem easily. I don't know how you would do it, but maybe for the necessary programs like that you could have a directory for those with base commands to keep them viable.

    Respectfully, Quicksandymurray

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  2. Anonymous
    2010-04-11T11:21:13+00:00

    microsoft is part of the plan of grand deceive and they trying to pis u off with depriveing you the basic windows features, same as microsoft pures milion of dollars to vaccinate poor africans with letal poison instad of giving them food and shelter or jobs... They are one big ____, dont read this if u wanna sleep

    xeeatwelve...net

    What does that cultic junk have to do with MS?

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