Windows Search is hammering my disk with IO
SearchProtocolHost and SearchFilterHost crawl every path in scope. A corrupt index keeps this running forever.
Try this first
- 1Open Indexing Options and review which locations are included
- 2Reduce scope: exclude complex folders like dev directories and archives
- 3Rebuild the index via Advanced, Rebuild, and let it run overnight
- 4For slow Outlook search: keep the PST in scope, otherwise nothing returns
When to bring us in
For persistent high IO: stop and disable the WSearch service and use a third-party indexer instead.
See also
- My laptop is suddenly slowThree main suspects: a runaway background process, near-full disk, or a Windows update in progress.
- One specific application is slow for everyoneIf an app is slow for one person: local. For everyone at once: server side or vendor side.
- Opening files from the file server takes minutesOften the server itself is fine and the issue is network routing or stalling DNS resolution.
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