I have lost the search facility

Hello everyone
went to use the search facility (using the icon next to start button) - window appeared, and after just 2 seconds disappeared. I do not use this much, but believe(?) that recent windows 10 updates have had an influence on this failure. Has anyone else had the same issue, and if so is there a workaround. I have tried the troubleshooter (which advised that a problem has been fixed) but in practice this is not the case,

W10 Version 2004 (OS Build 19041.329)
Thanks in advance for your help
C

This won't fix your Windows search tool...BUT you could download a Very Good search tool that is free and works a lot better than the Windows built-in search tool.
Its called Everything link below.. place it on your tool bar.

voidtools

OldMike65 said:

This won't fix your Windows search tool...BUT you could download a Very Good search tool that is free and works a lot better than the Windows built-in search tool.
Its called Everything link below.. place it on your tool bar.

voidtools

I have used it for a long time and it is FAR better than the Win 10 built-in option!

Hi Skofab, I guess you mean this:


Please try working through these possibilities:
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...2-5fc4efddb299

believe(?) that recent windows 10 updates have had an influence on this failure

Not yet heard of this- are you thinking of changes to file explorer search in 1909-2004?

Not related to the original question, but prompted by the above responses:
Sometimes people criticising Windows search do so because they haven't configured it appropriately or understood it well enough, and so become frustrated with it. And that's one of its biggest weaknesses- to work with it, you do need to understand a number of aspects of it, and configure what's indexed and which types of content are indexed according to your needs. Couple that with bad history from Windows XP days...

My view of it is that it's unsuited to a mass market, and the default configuration is unsuitable for general use, which is why free 3rd party tools get good ratings.

There is also quite complex search syntax you can use, which few know well for tightly specified searches.. E.g.
type:mp3 datecreated:1/3/18 .. 1/9/19 size:<4Mb

In the screenshot above, the options I've highlighted are interesting. (That's from build 1903- may differ in 2004)

That said, I wouldn't do without a 3rd party seach tool as well: I prefer Locate32 - which can also index network locations, which I believe Everything can't- and that uses more resources in my experience. The better-known free 3rd party tools do not index content, but can additionally search some text content in some types of files found.

Everything is a great file search tool but it doesn't look inside files like the Built-in search does.
Give Agent Ransack a try, great search program.

Windows built-in search has always been unstable, unreliable and inaccurate, through many previous Windows version. Yes, it should work, but having it fail is no great loss.

Plent of more accurate, reliable freeware programs
- UltraSearch
- Agent Ransack
(both these above will search filenames and contents)
- Everything

And there's no reason why you can't have more than one search program installed (I've got both UltraSearch (lightening fast!!) and Agent Ransack (marginally better than USearch for looking inside at file contents)

Could it be something simple?

Taskbar settings?

As for alternatives I prefer portable non-indexing utilities.

There have been many many comparisons and recommendations of 3rd party tools on many many threads. Maybe here it would be helpful to focus on Skofab's actual problem.

I thank you all for your time and interest - the two suggested alternatives have their merits, BUT, as Dalchina says - I really would like to restore the search facility that is commensurate with windows 10 - its simple and does the job.
Thanks again. but keep the ideas coming
Thanks
C

Have you looked at the link I posted?

Possibly more in this thread:
Search Popup Dissapears After Typing Two Characters

A useful diagnostic trick is to create a new user for test purposes, log in as that user and see what happens with the search box.

If it appears normally, the problem is specific to your user account.

Have you used any tweaks or modifications, tried to murder Cortana?