Windows 8.1 search charm slow, with explorer.exe CPU usage at 100%

Since upgrading to Windows 8.1 this weekend, the Search feature became pretty useless. When I start typing, it sends my CPU usage to 100% (Task Manager shows Windows Explorer as the main offender), and results are pretty slow. The funny thing is, I have a i7 with 8 logical cores, and this is one of the rare times a single program actually manages to utilize all of them at once. :)

Some searches which worked earlier (e.g. typing "devices" would bring out a "Devices and printers" link for the Control Panel) also aren't shown anymore if "Everything" is selected for searching. If I select "Settings" in the drop-down, then the "Devices and settings" link is shown, but it takes around 3s for the results to show up making the whole thing useless.

I tried disabling the Windows Search service completely (although it's not the one peaking the CPU), but it didn't help. Also disabled Bing web search integration in PC settings, but it didn't change anything (apart from the web results now being omitted from the slow search).

I have found a couple of similar threads online, but they don't offer any solutions:

Does anyone have a similar problem, and possibly a solution to this problem?

Since I've accustomed to hitting the Windows button and typing immediately to start my apps, I am considering two obvious solutions:

Reinstall plain old Windows 8 again
Install a third-pary Start menu app with a working search functionality

Groo

Posted 2013-10-29T10:20:35.997

Reputation: 996

This is a Windows 8.1 bug, no fix released yet, but you can try to rebuilt the search index. >> http://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/1182675-windows-81-search-causes-explorerexe-to-spike-to-100-cpu/ & https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/2a12dfac-b9be-4880-97ed-5b4ef9056360/search-charm-loads-100-cpu

– Rudolph – 2013-10-29T10:45:47.777

1@Rudolph: thanks. Rebuilding the Search index didn't help, and disabling it didn't help either. I also ran Process Monitor to see what was happening: it turns out that Explorer.exe is iterating through all folders on all of my disks when the search starts, and doesn't stop iterating even after I've already selected a result from the list (it just keeps going until it checks every single folder). Btw, your links are already included in my question. :) – Groo – 2013-10-29T10:55:09.710

I find it weird that more people aren't experiencing this. Does anyone have an idea why this problem is caused? (Ie, why is a necessary folder not in the indexing path by default?) – flindeberg – 2013-11-07T16:26:11.357

Answers

I've analyzed a xperf trace that an user gave me on technet, and the fix is to add the AppData folder, which is part of your Userprofile, back to the Search-Index.

magicandre1981

Posted 2013-10-29T10:20:35.997

Reputation: 86 560

Thanks, I'll try this first thing tomorrow morning and confirm if it worked. – Groo – 2013-10-29T21:44:14.013

Worked like a charm, thanks! It's a pity that I couldn't find this on TechNet/Microsoft Answers, as they are supposed to be their official sites, but as always, Stack Exchange has the best signal to noise ratio. :) – Groo – 2013-10-30T08:42:28.343

Btw, do you know if I also have to do something extra to force Windows to index (i.e. display in search results) Control Panel items? In other words, right now, typing something like "remove programs" or "printers" doesn't return anything. Is it possible that I've accidentally removed this from the indexer? I know that .cpl items are stored inside Windows\System32, but that doesn't seem like a location I'd want to index. – Groo – 2013-10-30T08:48:48.770

have you set the option to find partial matches in the Explorer options->search. – magicandre1981 – 2013-10-30T18:39:18.383

thanks, it works now, probably it just needed to finish indexing. – Groo – 2013-10-31T09:00:06.207

@magicandre1981 would you be able to analyze mine? it worked with Settings search but File search gives 75% cpu and Everything search gives 99% cpu and keep going until manual Explorer restart, some or no search results are present, some are from the locations I removed from index despite it was deleted and rebuilt – Chesnokov Yuriy – 2013-10-31T11:06:00.820

@ChesnokovYuriy capture a xperf trace with those steps: http://pastebin.com/8TBnxUk9

– magicandre1981 – 2013-10-31T17:23:40.080

I excluded all windows libraries and index reduced to 1500 items only. the script ran quite fast. I opened etl in WPA application. can you point me to on which information do you need me to screenshot for you? I may include some libraries for the second run for a heavy charms search tests. – Chesnokov Yuriy – 2013-10-31T19:07:02.437

@ChesnokovYuriy
I don't need screenshots, I need the file. Zip and uplaod the etl – magicandre1981 – 2013-11-01T06:07:45.887

it contains a list of all folders found in hdd. I'm not sure about other private information available. if you will be able to direct me on where to look in the WPA I will send you that information for investigation – Chesnokov Yuriy – 2013-11-01T13:25:29.017

@ChesnokovYuriy send me an email with the link at myusername (at] L i v e { d o t ] C O M – magicandre1981 – 2013-11-07T17:29:12.317

Adding X:\Users\[YOURUSERNAME]\AppData\Local\Packages to the index (through Indexing Options) fixes this. Alternatively you can also add the whole AppData folder as previously suggested but it seems a bit overkill to me.

BDX

Posted 2013-10-29T10:20:35.997

Reputation: 131

You might considering writting your answer in a way that its less of a response to another question but simply an alternative solution. The current statement could easily be a comment even though its also an answer. Your likely to get more upvotes if you revise your question to be simply an alternative solution. – Ramhound – 2013-10-30T13:07:32.530

+1 Thanks, that seems to be correct, I've excluded everything except the subfolder you mentioned and rebuilt the index, and it all works now. Additionally (perhaps because the index was completely rebuild), all my Control panel items are also included in search results now. – Groo – 2013-10-30T13:16:41.190

I wish this answer came up first in every search for this problem; I spent a week trying to figure out a way to do it without indexing all of AppData (it's utterly massive in mine). I hope MS releases a patch to either correct the problem or add this path soon. – SilverbackNet – 2013-11-13T21:26:28.423

Adding the AppData folder back to the Search-Index is not working for me. But after inspecting with Process Monitor, I found out that Explorer will continue search all files and folders in Libraries (which is disable by default in Windows 8.1) until it is completed. Bring Libraries back by http://lifehacker.com/how-to-bring-libraries-back-in-windows-8-1-1446756473 and remove all folders in Libraries or add them to Search-Index.

nhkhanh

Posted 2013-10-29T10:20:35.997

Reputation: 151

1+1 Thank you! My problem was that I moved my Documents folder to a different hard drive outside the Users folder. Naturally it fell out of index but stayed in the Documents library. Adding the new Documents location to the index solved it for me. – SnakE – 2014-02-02T13:46:43.433

This solved the issue for me. I had removed the Documents folder from the search index and added only specific subfolders inside of it (since 90% of the crap in Documents is stuff created by applications and not anything I'm interested in searching through), but did not touch the Documents library. I deleted all of my Libraries since I don't use the feature and search was back to normal. Thanks! – Victor – 2014-04-08T20:49:12.030

Nice, this fixed it for me as well. Thank you. – Wouter – 2014-06-03T19:38:42.757

Just add C:\Users\userfolder\AppData\Local\Packages\windows.immersivecontrolpanel_\LocalState\Indexed\Settings to your search index. If AppData folder isn't visible, enable "Show hidden files and folders" in View options.

Abhinav Kumar

Posted 2013-10-29T10:20:35.997

Reputation: 11