"Allow indexing service to index this disk for fast file searching"?

[mm]

Do you guys use "Allow indexing service to index this disk for fast
file searching"?

I think I found that off on my internal IDE FAT32 drive, and I turned
it on and it slowed things down a lot.

Tonight, I made a new partition on MY BOOK, a 500gig external WD
drive, and found it on by default. Now operations with the drive
have been quite fast, but won't turning index service off make them
even faster?

Also, on this HP Netbook that I'm fixing up for a friend, I checked
and it has the service allowed also? Now her computer is darn fast,
maybe because of the solid state drive and the 1.6 gig cpu. I only
have an 800 meg CPU, so maybe that's why it's fast to me.

Should I turn this off for her netbook and for my My Book?


Does "allowing" it mean it will always happen? I sort of think so
because of paragraph 2 above.

And when would I ever be able to take advantage of the index service
or fast file searching?? Does that just refer to Start/Search? Would
it even include search program from a 3rd party vendor I often use?
Maybe/maybe not, right?

Anyhow, I search only once in a while, I almost never search my
external My Book, and I do other things while a search is going on.
Isn't it better for that to be slow than my day to day operations to
be slowed?

Thanks a lot.

If it's bad, why is it the default on my external drive?

 

[mm]

Do you guys use "Allow indexing service to index this disk for fast
file searching"?

I think I found that off on my internal IDE FAT32 drive, and I turned
it on and it slowed things down a lot.

BTW, I didn't realize that, iiuc, the kind of indexing I'm referring
to here only applies to NTFS disks. I have only FAT32, but I did have
some sort of indexing that I turned on for a while and it slowed me
down a lot.

Now I have one NTFS partition for my friend on MY My Book, but I
probably will never look at it unless she has a crash or more malware.

So I ask only for her computer, which like I say is pretty fast.

And my exgirlfriend has complained about slowness. She's probably
never done a Search. I don't know if she even knows there are files
in the computer. She has XP with NTFS, so she should turn this off,
shouldn't she?

Thanks a lot

 

[Sunny]

BTW, I didn't realize that, iiuc, the kind of indexing I'm referring
to here only applies to NTFS disks. I have only FAT32, but I did have
some sort of indexing that I turned on for a while and it slowed me
down a lot.

Now I have one NTFS partition for my friend on MY My Book, but I
probably will never look at it unless she has a crash or more malware.

So I ask only for her computer, which like I say is pretty fast.

And my exgirlfriend has complained about slowness. She's probably
never done a Search. I don't know if she even knows there are files
in the computer. She has XP with NTFS, so she should turn this off,
shouldn't she?

Thanks a lot

Found this in one of my "How To" files

One of the worst offenders you have running is Fastfind. If you simply
remove it
from your start up group you will cause further problems,
because MS Office programs will continue to use the index files that
fastfind tries
to update in the background.
The correct way to disable fastfind requires that you delete the find fast
index files :-
1. Start Menu, then click on Control Panel.
2. In control Panel window, double click Find Fast.
3. In the "Index for documents in and below" list, click the first item.
4. On the Index Menu, click Delete Index. In the Delete Index dialog
box, click OK.
When you are prompted whether to delete the index, click OK.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until no more indices are listed.
6. On the Index Menu. click Close and Stop. Then click OK to stop Find
Fast.
7. Then, do either of the following:
Remove Find Fast shortcut from the startup folder, or
Run the MS Office97 Setup program in maintenance mode, and remove
Find Fast.

Find Fast is supposed to speed up the finding of files in an office LAN
type setup,
and is really not required by the majority of users.
(It can be re-enabled by adding the shortcut back into the startup
folder,
or running MS Office 97 Setup, and re-installing Find Fast

In XP it has become the 'Indexing service' of the search assistant. It
is perhaps less of a hog, but if you are not in the habit of searching
large numbers of document files by content, it is not doing you any
good. Really it is for Offices. In Explorer, fire up Search and take
its 'Change Preferences' then click 'Without Indexing service'.

And in My Computer, right click a Hard drive Icon, take Properties, and
make sure the box at the bottom 'Allow indexing. . . ' is not checked

 

[mm]

Reading some more, I found that that setting is only about allowing
indexing. The Indexing Service has to be running to do so, and the
easiest way to look into that was Start/Search/Set Preferences/the
third option down that says something about indexing.

And when I looked there, I see that indexing is turned off. In fact
the default is off.

Sorry to bother you, but I"m an NTFS newbie.


PS, that's where I turned it off too, why it was on even though I only
had FAT32, and why I was surprised to see something aobut indexing at
the bottom of an NTFS partition properties screen. I'd never looked
at one of those before.

 

[mm]

Fast Fix stuff snipped. I don't have MS Office but she does. I'll
take a look at it. (It came with the computer. She might use it once
in a while.)

In XP it has become the 'Indexing service' of the search assistant. It
is perhaps less of a hog, but if you are not in the habit of searching
large numbers of document files by content,

Content!! That's the important word. No, I never search files by
content. Maybe I should sometimes, but I don't. (it would take
forever, haha!)

And my friend has probably never searched for a file in her life, by
content or not.

it is not doing you any
good. Really it is for Offices.

There whole thing is driven by the Office market. That's why they
changed from directories to folders. It's why, I think, they allow
extensions of common file types to be hidden, why it's the default,
even though it bears so much risk with it.

In Explorer, fire up Search and take
its 'Change Preferences' then click 'Without Indexing service'.

And in My Computer, right click a Hard drive Icon, take Properties, and
make sure the box at the bottom 'Allow indexing. . . ' is not checked

Do I have to do that even though I did the previous paragraph? I did
that for my My Book, but not for her C: directory. BEcause it's not
mine, I wanted to make as few changes as necessary, but if it's
necessary, I'll do it.

 

[Sunny]

Fast Fix stuff snipped. I don't have MS Office but she does. I'll
take a look at it. (It came with the computer. She might use it once
in a while.)


Content!! That's the important word. No, I never search files by
content. Maybe I should sometimes, but I don't. (it would take
forever, haha!)

And my friend has probably never searched for a file in her life, by
content or not.


There whole thing is driven by the Office market. That's why they
changed from directories to folders. It's why, I think, they allow
extensions of common file types to be hidden, why it's the default,
even though it bears so much risk with it.


Do I have to do that even though I did the previous paragraph? I did
that for my My Book, but not for her C: directory. BEcause it's not
mine, I wanted to make as few changes as necessary, but if it's
necessary, I'll do it.

Beats me, the only thing close I could find was "Write Caching" under
policies.
I have it ticked on my WinXP and the other to "Optimise" are greyed out.
More about Write Catching" here :
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/332023

 

[mm]

Beats me, the only thing close I could find was "Write Caching" under
policies.
I have it ticked on my WinXP and the other to "Optimise" are greyed out.
More about Write Catching" here :
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/332023

I'll check it out. Thanks.

And thanks, Menno. They should warn you when they have something that
wastes your time.