Entered CNET Catalog: 10/16/2004
SKU: SERVGOOGLEDESKTOPBETA
Manufacturer: Google
User opinions
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User Rating: 
3/10
Love Google, but unhappy with Desktop Search
Pros: Integrates with Google online search
Cons: Slows CPU to a crawl
User Rating: 
2/10
plain old doesn't work!
Pros: interfaces with Outlook as a toolbar
Cons: inconsistent search results using operators
A prime example is boolean searching. Run a search for "x" yielding 50 hits. Run a search for 'y'yielding 100 hits. You would expect that the search "x" OR "y" would yield at least 100 hits, but it yields something in between!
Another example: search yield 30 hits sorted by date. When sort preference is changed to 'relevance', the number of hits changes!
I will never rely on Google Desktop Search again!
User Rating: 
5/10
Removed Because it Hogged Processor Resources
Pros: Thorough indexing with quick search response
Cons: It grabbed too much CPU time.
Perhaps there was a software update that conflicts in this computer. Copernic is functioning without problem on the notebook and I like it. Installed Copernic on my two desktops as well.
User Rating: 
8/10
one of the best pc hd searches
Pros: extremly fast searching kinda like spotlight
Cons: not as integrated into programs like spotlight
User Rating: 
1/10
Have you all lost it??
Pros: none at all
Cons: Your going to let google, search your harddrive??
I think you should all read this site, when you store your email on "gmail" afteer 180 days google can read through it without a warrent, selling at over 250.00 bux a share, why is it worth so much?? Google cookie tracks until the year 2038 on your pc. If you let something search your harddrive, then you are hacking yourself, i will laugh once its exploited, and then someone else searchs your hd
User Rating: 
7/10
It works but doesn't match up to Spotlight
Pros: Reads most file types, quite fast, integrates into Google
Cons: Clings to IE, has to open a brower window to search
The part that I liked about it was that it would display my results when I was searching on the normal Google, which turned out to be useful.
The part that I didn't like is that it wanted you to use IE for it, even though it worked fine in Opera and Firefox. What I did to solve this was bookmark the page on my computer in Opera and added it into my search box. It still would open IE from the actual program, but I had a bit of Opera access.
If it didn't cling to IE it would have been a much better product. But when I purchased my iBook and got the new Spotlight feature it makes GDS look like a child's toy. That's where I get a 7 from.
User Rating: 
6/10
Not as good as MSN's desktop search
Pros: good if you are anti-M$
Cons: just doesn't perform as well MSN
User Rating: 8/10
Fast, stable program
Pros: Super-fast search, sortable results
Cons: Indexing file eats up hard drive space, no advanced search capabilities
It searches most file types I care about (Outlook and Thunderbird e-mails; Netscape, IE, and Firefox web histories; Office files; PDFs; music, chat, and video files). Moreover, third-party plug-ins have expanded its search capabilities to include about any other program you might regularly use that can have indexable files. The program will not, however, search every file on your computer.
The results are sortable by file type, so if I only want "Radiohead" music files but not "Radiohead" pages from my web history, I can specify my results. The interface is simple if limited, as there is no advanced search - just the single-line Google search bar we're all used to. But for those with always-on internet, web and desktop searching become nearly seamless with Google.
User Rating: 
9/10
Fast and Smart
Pros: Fast, smart, and intuitive. Can retrieve desktop and web info at the same time.
Cons: None I can think of, yet.
User Rating: 8/10
Quick, under the covers and good
Pros: Finds what I want when I want it in what it was used as
Cons: Needs a way to cause reindexing and not indexing of temp file items
My only desire is that I could force it to reindex when it has items I don't want included.
The one weakness I see is it finds things that were in the temp area but are no longer there.
User Rating: 8/10
Powerful, fast, and easy to use.
Pros: Shows thumbnail size previews of files, even Media Player album covers for mp3 files.
Cons: Doesn't automatically index network drives.
User Rating: 9/10
GREAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Pros: Everything is perfect
Cons: nothing so far
User Rating: 9/10
Extraordinary!
Pros: Fast Index, Great Features, Fast Searches, Easy installation, Easy download!! Easy as 1-2-3
Cons: Opens web browser!!
