Mac OS has had spotlight search for years, which lets you search for a file through your entire computer in less than a second. Perfect for avoiding going through folders to find that file you need.

Vista has its own search bar now, which accomplishes nearly the same thing.


But what about XP? It doesn't come with such a useful feature built-in, but apparently Microsoft released a program called Windows Search that does it, for XP!
[ Link ]

Note: Unfortunately, I don't think it can launch applications.
Re-Note: Yes it can

Wait, you don't use MSDOS commands like everyone else? ;)

Didn't Google Desktop Search also do that since...Like forever?

Then again It came bundled with ads and crap didn't it?

windows? why would I wanna search my windows? i know where they all are and they all do the same thing: let me see outside my house.

But this lets you search what is inside your windows! ie. all the stuff inside your house.

Anyway, I know google did it, but google connects to the internet always and that's a little edgy. This one doesn't. Plus, it's neat to know microsoft actually did make this for windowsXP, even though it's not built-in like vista

oh you mean if I use this to index my cp I won't get v&? cool.

install gentoo.

I believe win7 has it built in... I'm too lazy to try it out (gotta turn on laptop etc) but err... Personally I don't like additional resources running for immediate indexing. I rarely search for anything and when I do it runs for about 5 minutes for 500gig and it's fine.

A cool feature for many, but for some... It'll be disabled the moment it's installed XD

I refuse. gentoo is evil.

Vista has it, so win7 should definitely have it built-in.
I'm glad to have this for XP though, since I don't use Vista, and I'm far too used to being able to access any file on my computer near-instantly using a search bar, due to mac OS X