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Level 1

12 points

Is there any alternative way to search an external hard drive following Apple's decision to remove external hard drive search functionality from OS 10.11?

With previous versions of OS 10 you could use Spotlight or Finder to search the contents of your external hard drive.

However, with OS 10.11 El Capitan, this functionality has been removed (according to Seagate tech support, at least).

In Finder I'm given the option to click on my external hard drive in the upper left corner, just like in Pinkstones' screenshot.

However, when I do so and proceed to search, it always brings me back to the main Finder screen, and only searches my hard drive. No matter how many times I try it never searches my external hard drive like I tell it to.

Is there any alternative way to search the contents of my external hard drive following Apple's decision?

MacBook Air, iOS 7.1, null

Posted on Jan 5, 2016 4:03 PM

17 replies

macjack

Level 10

111,168 points

Jan 5, 2016 6:00 PM in response to Hemutian

Turn off the search for invisibles and it will be faster.

EcoGreg

Level 3

876 points

Jan 5, 2016 7:23 PM in response to Hemutian

Spotlight indexing works for my external drives in El Capitan. Fresh install so no migrated data.

Make sure you have not excluded indexing in the Privacy settings of Spotlight in System Preferences.

Make sure after you first mount an external drive that you give Spotlight time to fully index the drives.

Works well for me and is fast.

WD drives have had multiple reported problems with Macs. How is the drive formatted? Is it password protected version of their drives? I have found less problems with WD using non-password protected drives like the USB3 Elements.

Hope this helps, Greg

Is there any alternative way to search an external hard drive following Apple's decision to remove external hard drive search functionality from OS 10.11?