Solved Windows Explorer search hits show location as unavailable

[ToughDiamond]

I did a Windows Explorer search (for *.jpg) but some of the hits wouldn't open, and "open containing folder" wouldn't work either - all I got was a message saying the location was unavailable. It turned out that I'd renamed the containing folder some time ago. The .jpg files were still there and opened fine when I manually browsed to them. So it seems that the Windows search was using out-of-date information. Is there any way of updating / refreshing it so that the searched items can be opened?

 

[torchwood]

Hi

suspect the default on the folder is set as documents not jpeg, so it stops searching

have a read of this tutorial


File Details Properties - Add, Change, or Remove


Roy

 

[ToughDiamond]

I could be wrong but I don't think it's that. What I didn't realise when I posted my question was that it doesn't just happen when I search for .jpg files, it happens with ANY file or filetype that I search for.
So a clearer description of the problem is this: If I rename a folder and then do a Windows search for any file that happens to be in that renamed folder, I get 2 hits - one that shows the new folder name and behaves properly, and a second one that shows the old folder name and can't open the containing folder (since a folder of that name no longer exists) or the file itself (since the pathname no longer exists as such). For some reason the Windows 7 search feature doesn't know that the old folder name is gone, and it clutters up my searches with invalid duplicate hits.

 

[file3456]

Windows search is a piece of crap in all honesty. Download and install Everything.exe and you'll have a more powerful and robust searching facility. In Everything.exe just search for jpg and it will list every single jpg you have on your OS hard drive, and hard drives connected as well as a USB storage device.

Downloads - voidtools

 

[subyroo]

You could also try UltraSearch, I use it all the time.

 

[file3456]

You could also try UltraSearch, I use it all the time.

I can't remember if it was UltraSearch or not, but I compared and contrasted both Everything.exe and UltraSearch or some other product and I got different results with each. What I do know is that the one I was testing against Everything.exe was a lot faster, but missed a few results vs Everything.exe. With Everything.exe it lists ALL search results based on your query. It doesn't even matter if the name matches DLLs, etc, it will list them.

Now I'm too lazy right now to compare UltraSearch and Everything.exe. Maybe latter on I'll see if there's a difference.

OP, if you use one of these search programs and decide to use it as your sole search mechanism like I do. Then go into Services in the Control Panel and turn off the indexing service. This will help with unneeded writes on a finite life cycle of a SSD if you use one and can help bump up OS performance. By what factor I'm not sure, but I do know the less processes and services you have to run the better.

 

[ToughDiamond]

Windows search is a piece of crap in all honesty.

Yes it's one of those features that got worse with every new version. I was happy enough with the Win98 version and I fondly remember the days when I could easily search for a filename without searching all the file contents at the same time. What were they thinking when they "improved" it?



Thanks for the suggestions of 3rd-party alternatives. I guess that'll be the way to go if a fix doesn't turn up. Do any of them integrate into Explorer, or are they standalone?

 

[file3456]

Thanks for the suggestions of 3rd-party alternatives. I guess that'll be the way to go if a fix doesn't turn up. Do any of them integrate into Explorer, or are they standalone?

I'm not sure if Everything.exe integrates into Explorer. You really don't need that. You just double click the program icon and enter a search query. I put the shortcut in my taskbar below. Read the FAQs as well. FAQ - voidtools

 

[ToughDiamond]

I'm not sure if Everything.exe integrates into Explorer. You really don't need that. You just double click the program icon and enter a search query. I put the shortcut in my taskbar below. Read the FAQs as well. FAQ - voidtools

I guess with a standalone tool I'd have to browse to the folder I wanted to search......most of the time when I'm about to do a search I've already got Explorer open in the right place, so it's handy to be able to simply type the search term into the box in Explorer without having to re-browse to it. And there may yet be a solution to the original problem - I strongly suspect that Windows didn't remove the old data from its search index, and that caused the problem. Not saying 3rd-party search tools aren't good, just that if there's a way of bending the Windows tool to my will, I'd rather try that first. I found this a few minutes ago, which might just do the trick. I'll report back when I've had time to give it a whirl: How to Fix Windows 7 Search Indexing Issues - Guiding Tech

 

[ToughDiamond]

Success It was just a matter of opening Indexing Options and rebuilding the index. My original problem was simply that I didn't know where the options were kept, because (as often is the case) I didn't know the name of the thing I was looking for. Thanks for your answers though. I'll probably try them out anyway, as it'd be good to have an alternative at my fingertips ready for the next time the Win7 search starts acting silly.


I'm still taking in the fact that Windows doesn't necessarily find every file that satisfies the search criteria. I guess they sacrificed reliability for speed, by failing to make their index bullet-proof.