Search indexer only works after service is restarted


richstant

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Windows 11
When I first upgraded to win11, the search indexer got underway. However I noticed after a few hours that it had got stuck without finishing - 'settings' says 'temporarily paused, will restart automatically', while under advanced indexing it just shows as 'paused'. It then just sat like that without starting again for the next day. I restarted the windows search service and it kicked back into life & completed. However after a reboot, the same thing happens - it sits on 'paused' and nothing new is indexed until I restart the search service. I tried rebuilding the search index, and the same thing happened - got so far, then paused & service needs restarting to kick it back into life.

Any thoughts on how to avoid having to restart the service every time I reboot? It's currently set to 'automatic (delayed start)', I've also tried 'automatic', to no avail.

Thanks!
 
Windows Build/Version
11

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
When I first upgraded to win11, the search indexer got underway. However I noticed after a few hours that it had got stuck without finishing - 'settings' says 'temporarily paused, will restart automatically', while under advanced indexing it just shows as 'paused'. It then just sat like that without starting again for the next day. I restarted the windows search service and it kicked back into life & completed. However after a reboot, the same thing happens - it sits on 'paused' and nothing new is indexed until I restart the search service. I tried rebuilding the search index, and the same thing happened - got so far, then paused & service needs restarting to kick it back into life.

Any thoughts on how to avoid having to restart the service every time I reboot? It's currently set to 'automatic (delayed start)', I've also tried 'automatic', to no avail.

Thanks!
Just checked mine, it is automatic (delayed start) it was running and had done the indexing. Mine was an upgrade from Win 10 and I am on build 22000.258 sorry I cannot be more helpful but the guys on this forum are ar :) e pretty clever
 

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    Windows 11 Pro
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When I first upgraded to win11, the search indexer got underway. However I noticed after a few hours that it had got stuck without finishing - 'settings' says 'temporarily paused, will restart automatically', while under advanced indexing it just shows as 'paused'. It then just sat like that without starting again for the next day. I restarted the windows search service and it kicked back into life & completed. However after a reboot, the same thing happens - it sits on 'paused' and nothing new is indexed until I restart the search service. I tried rebuilding the search index, and the same thing happened - got so far, then paused & service needs restarting to kick it back into life.

Any thoughts on how to avoid having to restart the service every time I reboot? It's currently set to 'automatic (delayed start)', I've also tried 'automatic', to no avail.

Thanks!
I have exactly the same problem. Indexing starts off fine, then gradually slows and the Indexing options dialog displays "indexing speed is reduced due to user activity" even when the PC has nothing else running. Eventually it pauses. I can restart it from Services but it soon slows and pauses again. Restarting kicks it back into life for a while till the same errors recur. Mine is a clean install of Win 11 on an new PC build. Having spent a day setting it up I really don't want to start over with Win 10 but can't work without a reliable search for files and emails.

I have tried the troubleshooting options but so far without success. Any ideas...untitled1.jpg?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
Wasn't it the general idea to de-prioritize background apps in W11?
 

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System One System Two

  • OS
    W10 Enterprise LTSC
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    custom
    CPU
    i7-2700K
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte GA-P67A-D3-B3
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    24GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    MSI GeForce RTX2060 Super
    Sound Card
    onboard
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Samsung curved
    Screen Resolution
    FHD
    Hard Drives
    Samsung EVO870 SSD 1TB
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    be quiet 550W
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    CoolerMaster
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    be quiet PURE ROCK SLIM BK008
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    KLIM Domination k852
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    Logitech standard cordless
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    10/1 DSL (the fastest line speed available here...)
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    Mozilla FF 91.2.0esr
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    Defender
    Other Info
    W10 GUI heavily modified with Stardock Blinds "7 for 10" skin and Startmenu.
    No MS Account and no MS apps.
    I upgraded to W10 only for gaming purposes, otherwise I'd kept my beloved W7 Ultimate x64
  • Operating System
    W11 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    custom
    CPU
    Intel Core i5-2500
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte PH67A-D3-B3
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics card(s)
    MSI Geforce 1050Ti
    Sound Card
    onboard
    Monitor(s) Displays
    FujitsuSiemens 19"
    Screen Resolution
    1280x1024 (oldschool 4:3)
    Hard Drives
    Samsung EVO850 SSD 250GB + Samsung 1TB HDD
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    be quiet 550W
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    Mars MCNW ATX Gaming
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    be quiet PURE ROCK SLIM BK008
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    oldschool Dell optical wired
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    Dell German 102
    Internet Speed
    slow DSL, 10/1Mbps, but thats the best offer here
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    Mozilla 91.2.0esr
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    Defender
    Other Info
    This is an older PC for testing new OS,
    Furthermore: 4 Dell/HP laptops on Win7 Ultimate x64, used for NAS, Media server, browsing, workshop and sound studio
Latest on this problem is that my PC is telling me the index is now complete, with approx 200,000 items indexed. And Outlook no longer displays the "results may be incomplete as indexing is in progress" message.

Searching for files in Windows Explorer seems to be working well, and very quickly compared to my old machine.

However, searching within Outlook delivers no results, irrespective of what criteria I set...

Don't you just love Microsoft!!
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
Just to close this thread from my perspective, I tried everything I could think of to get the Outlook index working, but without success. So I have wiped my system drive and rebuilt from scratch with Windows 10 Pro 64bit, which is working just fine. I'm now firmly at the back of the queue for the Windows 11 transition, hoping that by the time I get there the problem will have been fixed.

Interested to hear if anyone else has had similar difficulties...?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
I see that you had excluded AppData in your search settings, but ist't THAT exactly the place where Oulook stores its mail files ...?
 

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System One System Two

  • OS
    W10 Enterprise LTSC
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    custom
    CPU
    i7-2700K
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte GA-P67A-D3-B3
    Memory
    24GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    MSI GeForce RTX2060 Super
    Sound Card
    onboard
    Monitor(s) Displays
    Samsung curved
    Screen Resolution
    FHD
    Hard Drives
    Samsung EVO870 SSD 1TB
    Seagate Barracuda HDD 8TB
    PSU
    be quiet 550W
    Case
    CoolerMaster
    Cooling
    be quiet PURE ROCK SLIM BK008
    Keyboard
    KLIM Domination k852
    Mouse
    Logitech standard cordless
    Internet Speed
    10/1 DSL (the fastest line speed available here...)
    Browser
    Mozilla FF 91.2.0esr
    Antivirus
    Defender
    Other Info
    W10 GUI heavily modified with Stardock Blinds "7 for 10" skin and Startmenu.
    No MS Account and no MS apps.
    I upgraded to W10 only for gaming purposes, otherwise I'd kept my beloved W7 Ultimate x64
  • Operating System
    W11 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    custom
    CPU
    Intel Core i5-2500
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte PH67A-D3-B3
    Memory
    4GB
    Graphics card(s)
    MSI Geforce 1050Ti
    Sound Card
    onboard
    Monitor(s) Displays
    FujitsuSiemens 19"
    Screen Resolution
    1280x1024 (oldschool 4:3)
    Hard Drives
    Samsung EVO850 SSD 250GB + Samsung 1TB HDD
    PSU
    be quiet 550W
    Case
    Mars MCNW ATX Gaming
    Cooling
    be quiet PURE ROCK SLIM BK008
    Mouse
    oldschool Dell optical wired
    Keyboard
    Dell German 102
    Internet Speed
    slow DSL, 10/1Mbps, but thats the best offer here
    Browser
    Mozilla 91.2.0esr
    Antivirus
    Defender
    Other Info
    This is an older PC for testing new OS,
    Furthermore: 4 Dell/HP laptops on Win7 Ultimate x64, used for NAS, Media server, browsing, workshop and sound studio
No I keep my Outlook data files on a different drive - "Data SSD D:" - alongside the rest of my user data in order that they are kept routinely backed up. Indexing works fine on Windows 10 in this configuration.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
Experiencing exactly the same thing... Goes from "indexing" to "reduced speed" to nothing and then finally to "paused" - and I'm just sitting here watching the screen, nothing else is going on.

Looks like they have completely destroyed Search - what happened to the "see more results" link that opened a window with EVERYTHING that search found on the computer related to what you type?????

And how the !$#@&!! do I turn off web search completely??? - if I want to search the web, I'll use some web search engine like Google... All I want is to find stuff on my computer! I have already turned off the bogus Bing search via registry hack, however the search panel still always defaults to "All" and offers me up web crap I am not interested in. Most often the "best match" is "See web results" when indeed there are dozens of matches in files and folders on this PC. (fixed, see below)

Edit - OK, that last I have been able to reg-hack via this article: How to disable online search from Start Menu in Windows 11
 

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    Windows 11 Pro
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    i7 12700KF
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    Asus Prime Z690-P
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    Coolermaster MB600L
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    be quiet! Dark Rock 4
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    Logitech
    Mouse
    Logitech
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    Fast
    Browser
    Various
Experiencing exactly the same thing... Goes from "indexing" to "reduced speed" to nothing and then finally to "paused" - and I'm just sitting here watching the screen, nothing else is going on.
Glad it's not just me! Oddly, I have a surface pro 4 as well, and search works fine there. So there's obviously some set of conditions that causes the problems. I just don't know what those conditions are!
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
Yeah i binned indexing altogether, Especially if its on an SSD theres no need for it. No reg hack was required to turn it off.
 

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  • OS
    11
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Custom
    CPU
    10700k@5.2
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    Gigabyte Gaming X Z490
    Memory
    Viper Steelseries 32gb@ 3600mhz
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    Gigabyte 2070 Super 8GB, +200 core + 600 memory
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Yeah i binned indexing altogether
How does that work? Doesn't it need an index to find stuff? I have 2 SSD's with 330K+ items indexed, it now says "Indexing complete". So maybe it is now working, just needed a lot of time - last time I had looked it was only at 200K items.

I am still badly missing the "see more results" window opening that I could choose what I want. If anyone has a way to enable that or an add-on which will work that way, I'll buy you a beer! 🍺🍺 And of course, my Outlook mails are completely absent from the search. In Win 8.1 they showed up, but I couldn't open them directly from Search anyway (some kind of MAPI error message), so I got used to searching for them only directly in Outlook - so I'm not really put out by that.
 

My Computer

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  • OS
    Windows 11 Pro
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Custom built
    CPU
    i7 12700KF
    Motherboard
    Asus Prime Z690-P
    Memory
    32 Gb
    Graphics Card(s)
    Asus Geforce RTX 3060 12Gb
    Sound Card
    -
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    2x 4K monitors
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    3840 x 2160 (x2)
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    1 Tb WD NVMe primary (Windows)
    2 Tb Crucial SSD secondary (data)
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    Coolermaster MB600L
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    be quiet! Dark Rock 4
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    Logitech
    Mouse
    Logitech
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    Fast
    Browser
    Various
my general rule of thumb is
  1. Good CPU and a standard hard drive = Keep indexing on
  2. Slow CPU and any hard drive = Turn indexing off
  3. Any CPU with an SSD = Turn indexing off
Indexing was brought in to help HDD drives mainly.
Main reason i turned it off to be honest was it was using like 10% of my cpu on and off so instead of working out what its issue was i just disabled it which sorted that issue, Searches work just as quick if not quicker than they did prior and theres no load on my cpu from it, It didnt used to use anything noticeable but after an update it did so rip. xD
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    11
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Custom
    CPU
    10700k@5.2
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte Gaming X Z490
    Memory
    Viper Steelseries 32gb@ 3600mhz
    Graphics Card(s)
    Gigabyte 2070 Super 8GB, +200 core + 600 memory
    Monitor(s) Displays
    ASUS 4k HDR, Two 1080p Benq and Samsung
    Screen Resolution
    3840x2160/2560x1440/1920x1080
    Hard Drives
    Adata XPG SX8200 PRO 1tb
    Samsung EVO 870 500GB
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    Corsair RX 650
    Case
    NZXT h510
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    CM HYPER 212 RGB
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    Razer Ornata Chroma
    Mouse
    Steelseries Rival 710
The problem is outlook - you don't get any search function at all if the indexer is off.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
The problem is outlook - you don't get any search function at all if the indexer is off.
Hm mine seems fine on this end with it off
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    11
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Custom
    CPU
    10700k@5.2
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte Gaming X Z490
    Memory
    Viper Steelseries 32gb@ 3600mhz
    Graphics Card(s)
    Gigabyte 2070 Super 8GB, +200 core + 600 memory
    Monitor(s) Displays
    ASUS 4k HDR, Two 1080p Benq and Samsung
    Screen Resolution
    3840x2160/2560x1440/1920x1080
    Hard Drives
    Adata XPG SX8200 PRO 1tb
    Samsung EVO 870 500GB
    PSU
    Corsair RX 650
    Case
    NZXT h510
    Cooling
    CM HYPER 212 RGB
    Keyboard
    Razer Ornata Chroma
    Mouse
    Steelseries Rival 710
I first upgraded to win11, the search indexer got underway. All items were indexed, and there was no issue. But the new emails are not indexed- under the advance tap - it just shows as 'paused'. I restarted the computer, but it showed 'Paused'. I continued the windows search service, and it kicked back into life & completed. However, after a reboot, the same thing happens - it sits on 'paused', and nothing new is indexed until I restart the search service. I tried rebuilding the search index, and the same thing happened - got so far, then paused & service needs restarting to kick it back into life. I changed to “Automatic” instead of a delayed start, but it stayed on ‘paused’.



Does anybody have an idea to solve this problem?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11
    Computer type
    Laptop
    Manufacturer/Model
    LENOVE T480
    CPU
    Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-8550U CPU @ 1.80GHz 1.99 GHz
    Memory
    8.00 GB
    Graphics Card(s)
    64-bit operating system, x64-based processor
    Hard Drives
    1TB SSD
Hmmm this is weird to me. I use outlook as a work email. Indexing is off. Yet I can search through hundreds of emails and find what I need with indexing off
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    11
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    Manufacturer/Model
    Custom
    CPU
    10700k@5.2
    Motherboard
    Gigabyte Gaming X Z490
    Memory
    Viper Steelseries 32gb@ 3600mhz
    Graphics Card(s)
    Gigabyte 2070 Super 8GB, +200 core + 600 memory
    Monitor(s) Displays
    ASUS 4k HDR, Two 1080p Benq and Samsung
    Screen Resolution
    3840x2160/2560x1440/1920x1080
    Hard Drives
    Adata XPG SX8200 PRO 1tb
    Samsung EVO 870 500GB
    PSU
    Corsair RX 650
    Case
    NZXT h510
    Cooling
    CM HYPER 212 RGB
    Keyboard
    Razer Ornata Chroma
    Mouse
    Steelseries Rival 710
OK, that's good to know. I was going on the basis that when indexing is paused, outlook search doesn't update either. But I guess if you turn it off completely, outlook goes back to it's native search. As regards the 'fix' posted by Rob - as far as I can see, that's just waiting for the indexing to complete. In my case the initial indexing completed fine, and I've tried rebuilding the index, but the problem persists.
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 11

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