Reminder - Windows Search 4 coming to WU soon...

Hi everyone –

Thought I’d drop a line and remind you that we’re planning to release Windows Search 4.0 (KB940157) via Windows Update sometime in late July. Windows Search 4.0 updates previous versions of Search in Windows Vista SP1, Windows XP SP2 and Windows XP SP3, Windows Server 2003 SP2, Windows Server 2008, and Windows Home Server.

                                                  

Windows XP users will see Windows Search 4.0 available as an Optional update, which means you must visit the Windows Update Web site to install it. Windows Vista users with SP1 installed will see the update as a Recommended update. This means that, if a Windows Vista user has set their machine to automatically install updates, Windows Search 4.0 will automatically install on PCs running Windows Vista SP1. The release of Windows Search 4.0 to Windows Update will be gradual for these users. If you’re running Windows Vista SP1, and you would like to install it right away, you can go to the Windows Update control panel and install it manually once it is made available.

One thing you should note: In order to make search functionality more efficient and reliable, the Windows Search team updated the structure of the search index in this release. This requires re-indexing users’ data. The re-indexing occurs in the background after the installation is completed and a reboot has been performed. The cool part? Windows Search will release most of the requested resources and slow down the indexing process as soon as it detects mouse or keyboard activity, or when another application requires computer resources.

 If your organization is running Windows Vista Service Pack 1, has no update management solution, and would like to postpone the installation of Windows Search 4.0, the Windows Search team has provided guidance on how to do so here.

And, if you’d like to find out more about Windows Search 4.0, check out the Windows Experience Blog.