Best Desktop Search Applications?

There’s little worse than needing a file fast, and not being able to find it. The search tool in Vista is almost useless, and overly complicated, but what other options are there? Surprisingly, there are loads of options available and they go far beyond anything the simple finder tool in your native OS can handle.

Lifehacker rounds-up five different search tools, so that you can find one perfect for you. The most common solution is Google Desktop, which has the major benefit of working on all three major OS’. It has the ability to search inside of documents, your web history, in e-mails and others, in order to show you the result fast. I admit, I like this idea… being able to find documents because of words found inside is a huge benefit.

Other popular tools is the oddly-named Locate32, a Windows-only offering and Copernic Desktop Search. That name brings back memories, because in the earlier days of the web, Copernic developed some really great tools that allowed you to find anything on the web. I used it often, but nowadays, you don’t need such an application for the most part. But I digress. If you want a cool desktop search tool, check out the post.

Copernic Desktop Search indexes and searches your desktop-including email and pretty much anything else that lives on your hard drive. Copernic has been around for years, and despite lacking a strong backer like Microsoft or Google, it’s still a must-have desktop search application for many faithful users.