General: Windows "find that file"

I use many files every day and it takes too much time to find them by opening folders/ then subfolders until I find what I am after. I am curious whether there are good ways /programs to streamline file navigation in Windows XP or Vista?

I wrote one app. myself that turned out to be just what I need - use it every day many times. http://netcpp.com/WinBookmark.htm

(needs .NET 2.0 from MS to work, links to .NET are on the same page).

The app I wrote simply allows to use buttons as shortcuts, much like when you use standard Windows XP "Open File" menu and there click the "My Computer" or "Desktop" icon to jump there. Except, now there are 22 assignable buttons.

If anyone finds the app useful please feel free to use; I would be happy to hear about better ways, if there are.

 

I just put the file name in Vista's search box, and it finds the file almost instantaneously. I even have the indexing options turned off. Does it do something different than that?

Thank you for your effort and for sharing though!

 

Yes, and I use "google desktop" for keyword searching.

I still prefer shortcut buttons due to ergonomics: to
find folder "settings" by keyword:
Open start menu (1 click)
Type "settings" = 8 buttons pressed.
...11 folders with name "settings" found. A mess requiring further reading of folder locations etc, a distraction. Add time for misspells-corrections and forgotten folder names.

With shortcuts - 1 click to open the app and then 1 click to go to any of its remembered locations, which open from within the program (no clutter of open folders on desktop).

 

Vista search is amazing, I feel like I am trapped now working on XP machines. It has completly changed the way I interact with PC's I just type the name or part of the name or a piece of m eta data and in a flash what I am looking for is there. I have tried desktop searches under XP and they generaly bring the system to a crawl. Vista search seams to carry a very low system resource overhead.

Typing a word brings me recent emails, websites, photos (with that word in the title or tag), files etc.

 

This might be useful. I will try it out later.

 

Can you post screen-shots? I couldn't quite get what you mean.

Thank you!

 

Locations that are accessed often during the day (Desktop; User; folder with current *.doc documents; Programs etc.) can be assigned to left buttons.

In the end, it's like Windows Explorer for file browsing, except you can - at any moment - jump to where left buttons point.

 

Did you make it specifically for Windows XP? I'm asking because Windows Vista has a navigation pane as well, and does exactly that. I have 14 such places put there. Or am I missing something?

Thank you, and I have repped you.

 

That's a great news. I am switching to Vista next week, BTW.

And yes, I made this app for WinXP not hoping that MS is ever going to incorporate this function.

I guess, then my app is for those who want to get a little Vista-like on XP and earlier Windows

 

MS finally got search right... I have about 90 gb of data on my computer and windows search works great... search is the same as on vista... Now the three to six hours that you load it, yea, your system might be slow... but really, you don't index 90 gb of data (or even 20 gb) in two minutes. I loaded it and let it do its thing overnight.... every since then, I've not had a problem with speed or resources.