The Win7 universal search facility seems to have gone from Win10

[JonDBee]

For 10 years I have been running my W7 desktop. It's been the best system I have ever run. Rock solid (I can’t remember when I last had a BSOD – several years ago), and a totally reliable host for all my apps. However the system has been slowing and pausing increasingly frequently in the last 6 months or so, so I persuaded myself to buy a big desktop to run Win10. (Ryzen 12 cpus, 32GB, M.2 SSD etc).
The results show that Win10 appears to be a backward step forme.



There is an almost impenetrable layer of junkware in just about every system feature. I get BSODs about 1 - 2 times a day, plus about 3 - 6 crashes of Firefox per day. The Win10 installation (Pro) was straight from Microsoft but all the network discovery services were turned off, so I had to sort all that out for the new box to even see my home LAN.


I have been appalled at the huge number of totally un-needed changes that MS have made to the god utilitarian stuff in Win7. E.g. File Explorer is a non-obvious mess with tabs all over the place.


What brings me to write is that I cannot yet finds the facility that was one of Win7's great work enablers, the ability to press the Windows key and put in a search term that could be sought over all files and all emails, or even input more than one search term by enclosing the terms in parentheses, in order to find what you were looking for.



This HAS to have been the single greatest workflow enabler in the whole Win7 operating system, as it allows all data objects to be searched associatively, so you don’t have to have deep multi-level fixed hierarchies of folders to separately store similar stuff together in order to find things. The search facility also removes much of the pressure to have an email folder hierarchy that mirrors that of the file system (Big +).
Anyway, that magic facility seems to have gone, and if that’s really so then I am sore about it. If this type of search can be done in Win10 could I please learn how?

Thanks,

Jon

 

[SIW2]

You might be better asking questions about win10 at windows 10 forum.

 

[samuria]

You should have a search box on the taskbar which does all that and web as well or you can use contana

 

[SIW2]

For 10 years I have been running my W7 desktop. It's been the best system I have ever run. Rock solid (I can’t remember when I last had a BSOD – several years ago), and a totally reliable host for all my apps. However the system has been slowing and pausing increasingly frequently in the last 6 months or so

We might be able to help with that. It could be that a fresh/repair install of win7 and/or a new disk (preferably ssd/nvme ) will sort that out.

so I persuaded myself to buy a big desktop to run Win10. (Ryzen 12 cpus, 32GB, M.2 SSD etc).
The results show that Win10 appears to be a backward step for me.

You could probably run win7 on the new machine, if you wish. Many people using win7 with the new Ryzens.

 

[RoWin7]

Or you can dual-boot with 7 until you decide if you want to dump 10. Or save 10 for when we absolutely have no choice. Put them on separate hard drives, sharing the same data. My 7 is pretty speedy on this SSD with a fast CPU.

Your other 7 probably just needs a good cleaning, like Glary Utilities.

I use the free SuperFinder XT for searching, faster than Windows.

 

[flavallee]

Or you can dual-boot with 7 until you decide if you want to dump 10. Or save 10 for when we absolutely have no choice. Put them on separate hard drives, sharing the same data. My 7 is pretty speedy on this SSD with a fast CPU.

That's pretty much how I've set up all my Dell OptiPlex 9020 minitowers:
2 separate SSD's
Windows 7 and Windows 10 installed in each SSD for dual booting
Same software apps and personal data

 

[RoWin7]

So you can use 7 while cleaning 10 for some future use. You can use Classic Shell to modify the UI. There was a program for scrubbing bloatware out of a new computer, but I can't think of the name, and don't know if it works with 10. something-Crapware?? You have to ask the Win10 forum.

 

[Snick]

That's pretty much how I've set up all my Dell OptiPlex 9020 minitowers:
2 separate SSD's
Windows 7 and Windows 10 installed in each SSD for dual booting
Same software apps and personal data

I do the same except triple boot Win7, Win10 & Linux Lite.

 

[Snick]

So you can use 7 while cleaning 10 for some future use. You can use Classic Shell to modify the UI. There was a program for cleaning bloatware out of a new computer, but I can't think of the name, and don't know if it works with 10. something-Crapware?? You have to ask the Win10 forum.

Replacing the Windows Start menu with a more traditional Start menu, Open Shell lets you customize the menu with the folders and shortcuts of your choice. Open Shell is based on another Windows Start menu alternative called Classic Shell. A popular program, Classic Shell ceased active development in December 2017.

Download Open-Shell (Formerly Classic-Start) - MajorGeeks
Open-Shell - Classic Shell Reborn, and pretty neat too



Snick

 

[RoWin7]

But the instructions for Classic Shell still apply, and it also restores a normal-looking Win Explorer or whatever 10 calls it.

Thought of me bloatware eliminator--Decrapifier.

 

[RoWin7]

I do the same except triple boot Win7, Win10 & Linux Lite.

You keep your data on a partition or on a 4th HD?

 

[Snick]

All SSDs, I keep data on a partion, no 4th SSD.
Backups to 4TB external HDD.

 

[Rod222]

For 10 years I have been running my W7 desktop. It's been the best system I have ever run. Rock solid (I can’t remember when I last had a BSOD – several years ago), and a totally reliable host for all my apps. However the system has been slowing and pausing increasingly frequently in the last 6 months or so, so I persuaded myself to buy a big desktop to run Win10. (Ryzen 12 cpus, 32GB, M.2 SSD etc).
The results show that Win10 appears to be a backward step forme.

Wow! unbelievable, I have the same sentiments, and experience, I just shelled out $1200 for Win 10, there are some likes, but I really miss my W7, have just bout 2 new desktops for installing Win7

I was never aware of the windows 7 search keystrokes , option dang!

I have been using XYPlorer for searching the desktop and my 400,000 images.

 

[JonDBee]

Hey guys, thanks ever so much for all these options and ideas. The idea of a second SSD with Win7 on it, and even a third with LINUX, really appeals to me. I can see things that I must try out. That could mean that I won't need to spend on some win10 versions of sotware I use regularly, like Nuance Dragon dictation software. Last night I joined tenforums and was alerted to the way indexing options can be set on win10, so this morning all my data content is indexed (like I had it on the win7 machine). The searching is now instantaneous but I havent yet found out how to have all the results put into a File Magager type of window. On win7 I could sort the results by "Type", look through email, then move on to Word documents etc. If I could get back to that I would be v happy.
Kind regards,
Jon

 

[iko22]

In FIle Explorer, Click on the "View" tab then select "Details". This should bring the "Type" field into view. Click on "Type" to sort files by this field.

 

[JonDBee]

Hi Iko22, my problem is that win7 puts everything it finds into a File Explorer view, be it email or document etc., so I can then browse them how I like. With win10 there seems to be no way to do a search of all local objects and see the results in a File Explorer view. Also, I use MS Outlook for my mails and there seems no way to get the magnifier to search that :-(

 

[iko22]

To search all files and folders in File Explorer, click on "This PC", then type your search term into the search box. That will search anywhere that the logged in User has permission to access, for you. That will be equivalent to searching "Computer" or "My Computer" in Vista or Windows 7 Explorer.

 

[JonDBee]

Hi Iko,

what you suggest is a great improvement though as yet I can't see any email in the list. It's finding .docx, .xlsx, .jpz .xip all ok but no emails. I've been sniffing round the options on the Search Tools tab but with no joy. I should add that I use MS Outlook for email. All my data, including the Outlook .pst files is on one drive so I can avoid needing to search the C: drive. Tantalisingly close......