Spotlight wont stop indexing

My Spotlight wont stop indexing. It says (and has always said) there is about 2000 hrs left until it has finished indexing... hence I cant use. Any idea of how I can fix this? THANKS!

Launch the Terminal app in /Applications/Utilities/, copy & paste this command into the window that pops up, and hit the return key:
*sudo mdutil -E /*
When the Password: prompt pops up, enter your admin password, carefully, since nothing shows up on the screen, and hit the return key. When the prompt returns, quit the Terminal app.
The command +causes the local store for the boot volume to be erased. The store will be rebuilt.+ The store is what contains the index and supporting items.

Similar Messages

Spotlight /non-stop indexing for 2 days, Please Help!

Hello, I need help with the Lion as the beaset seems to be wild! I have been having little bugs since I installed Lion and most have been solvable by help from people like you and your on-line posts. My Lion has been indexing, first time, for the last day and a half! Can you PLEASE HELP me solve this problem as I am having trouble doind any other operation and cannot stop the indexing! I was thinbking about going back to Snow Leopard as I did not have any problems with that OS but I do like many of Lion's features. Any help would be apprecited!
Thank you in advance and enjoy life's ,moments as they are gifts.
,Joe

Do you use a Time Capsule? If so, connect to it with an Ethernet cable and reboot. Enter Time Machine and then exit. It should finish rebuiling the index in a couple of hours. If the problem persists, erase your Time Capsule.

Spotlight doesnt stop indexing

every time i start my computer, spotlight indexes my 500 gig external hard drive.i assumed it had to do this on first boot, so i let it run its course and finish.
now it does it every time i start my machine.
anyone else had this happen?

From System Preferences > Spotlight select "Privacy" and then the "+" and add the drives that you do not want indexed:
The drives have to be on initially to select them.
Regards,

Spotlight selectively stops indexing

So after a massive desktop reorganization, after which I'd finally have just the one folder wherewith spotlight would help make everything clutter-free, I noticed a good deal of what I'd recently moved wasn't turning up in searches.
Looking up some possibly solutions for indexing problems, I did the standard add/remove HD, and after reindexing, twice, now it's showing less than ever before, searching what appears to only be music, mail and dictionary entries. Folders are sometimes included, though only if I'd physically opened myself. It's just too frustrating for words, especially after having spent a day planning the entire new setup around it.
I've seen some other possible remedies but I don't really want to start doing sudo stuff without knowing exactly what I'm doing.
Any other suggestions???

Try this. Click on the Desktop, CMD+F, click on Kind button, select Other, drill down to File invisible, check it, continue down to System files, check it, and click OK. Now, click on + button, click on the left-hand item and select System files and select are included, click on the plus button, click on the left-hand item and select File visibility and select visible or invisible, select File Name, save the search, drag its icon to the Dock, and use to search your entire Mac—currently starts with By Name, but Contents is available. I use this instead of CMD+F or CMD+spacebar for all searches.
If that finds all of your stuff, then it's properly indexed. If not, then come back and I'll give you the simple CLI commands to reindex.

Spotlight no longer indexes remote server

I have a small network of Mac, one of which acts as our "server" simply by sharing a raid disk set up. Spotlight on the other Macs has always been able to index the contents of this "server". Because the results from searches have lately been eratic, I wondered if Spotlight had stopped indexing the raid drive. It seemed it has.
I tried to add the drive to Spotlight's Privacy area so I could remove it again, as mentioned in a number of threads. It will not allow me to add it. I get this "Privacy List Error The item couldn't be added or removed because of an unknown error."
I get the same message no matter which Mac I try.
I tried updating the software on the "server", checking the permissions in the Get Info area, turning every computer off and rebooting them all.
I'm not sure what to do now.

Keith Thirgood wrote:
I'm not sure what to do now.
see if anything here helps: http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/stopspotlightindex.html.
JGG

Spotlight does not stop indexing

I need help: Just started the brand new MacPro 2x 2.66. The long desired spotlight (I run osx 1.3.9 before) does not work. Spotlight never stop to index. It runs and runs. If I add the hard drive to privacy in the system preferences it stops, but as soon as I get it back it just continues to index. So I've never been able to use Spotlight. Another harddrive in the machine (one without just data, no system) is swiftly indexed. But as soon as I have the main HD open for indexing, Spotlight continues to index for ever.
The harddrive causing the prooblem has previously been used in another computer under 1.3.9
Any ideas for fixing this would be much appreciated.
MacPro 2x 2.66 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Hello,
I'm seeing the same kind of problem. Here are the symptoms:
-Some or all data from a Mac previously running 10.3, is migrated to a Mac using 10.4. The Migration Assistant is used.
-Spotlight will continuously re-index, stop for a brief period, and repeat, either by itself, or when a search is attempted.
-Erasing the indices with mdutil -E, running fsck, fixing permissions and stopping/starting Spotlight doesn't resolve the problem.
-Excluding the migrated user directory will stop the madness. I.e., other users and shared directories like Applications, are searchable, and Spotlight will stop the continuous re-indexing.
-Recreating the user directory from scratch, and then copying in data from a backup, may once again start the madness.
The big question is, what, exactly, causes the indexing cycle?
The client affected by the problem is very disappointed, and had cause to wonder "how is this any better than Vista? I would have been better off with a Windows PC". I really need to resolve this, but I'm not sure of the best way to get Apple Tech involved with this bug.
Many Macs Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Time capsule not backing up - spotlight doesn't stop indexing!

I have asked Spotlight not to index the backup drive however it ignores this and continues to try and do so. However it continues to estimate index time without providing a time, and hence the backup never proceeds.
Rebooting hasn't helped, and I'm even pluggintg the MBP into the TC via ethernet.
Any ideas please?

I'm having the same problem. Added the time capsule to the privacy list but this doesn't appear to prevent indexing. Basically every time time machine backup kicks off it indexes the time capsule, which is of no value to me. I believe this is a recent issue, but I can't say for certain what changed. Recent software update? Anyway, did you ever get to the bottom of it? My backups do complete, however it slows down the process and of course i can't use spotlight while its "estimating/completing" index of time capsule.

Spotlight has stopped working on my brand new iMac

I've had my new 17" Intel iMac for one day...and Spotlight has all of a sudden stopped working.
It happened when I connected the G4 iMac to the new one but before I even accessed the G4. I tried to search for "Migration" using Spotlight and it didn't work. The 2 Macs were not even communicating yet so the old one could not have corrupted the new one.
Any ideas on how I can get SL to work again? I've done some searches but don't really understand what the solutions are. There are no files at all on my iMac as it is brand new. All I have done is use Safari and iTunes.
Help!

The thing to remember about Spotlight on a new Mac is that it needs some time to itself to contemplate working for you, its new master, and to index your entire new HDD.
The Mac OS from the factory is a quick burn and Spotlight hasn't indexed anything. Plus it needs time to index new files that you begin installing. Until it indexes everything it won't work too well.

Spotlight has stopped working properly. Even when a known file is entered (with full file name) in search, it fails to find it. Any ideas?

Spotlight has stopped working properly. Even when a known file is entered (with full file name) in search, it fails to find it. It finds some things, but is not to be depended upon. Any ideas?

Try reindexing spotlight: Spotlight: How to re-index folders or volumes - Apple Support
If you still have problems, open Console app, select All Messages, then search for mds in the search field. Then search for mdworker. See if there are any messages indicating it is having problems with certain files.
You can also delete the index altogether and cause it to reindex with a command in Terminal. I have always assumed the method above will do the same, but I'm not certain. You must run this command while logged into an admin account. Copy the whole line and paste it into Terminal.
sudo mdutil -E /
sudo temporarily elevates your privileges and will ask for your password. When you type it in, there won't be any response in the Terminal. Just type it and hit return.

Spotlight just stopped

Like others, my Spotlight stopped working. I have just recently upgraded to Mac OS 10.4.3. I have erased all the widgets. I have placed the hard drive in to Spotlight system preference Privilege window times 2, left it for a while and then deleted it and Spotlight attempted to index on two different occasions without effect. I have used the disk utility in the Utility folder and repaired permission twice without effect. What do I do next.
[email protected]

Rebuild/re-index spotlight.
HTH

Spotlight not working, indexing forever. Apple: Wake Up!

Since upgrading to Snow Leopard, Spotlight has stopped working properly. This is not a 3rd party tool; this is part of the system. Spotlight says it is indexing with an estimated time of 30 hours. Five minutes later it's 60 hours. Then it's two hours. Etc. For days on end. Then all of a sudden it finishes indexing and works. For two days. I've removed the start up disk in the privacy setting and replaced it. I've removed the pref file. I removed a whole bunch of importers. Nothing helps. I read somewhere that someone with this problem had to do a clean install (not easy in Snow Leopard); do I have to waste hours, even days because nobody from Apple wants to read these discussions? One time when it was working, I did a Time Machine backup and then it immediately stopped working. (No, it's not set to index the Time Machine disk, which isn't even connected right now). Time Machine, Spotlight...these are part of the system software and they don't work together?!? This feels on a par with the guest account data loss problem. Snow Leopard was an incremental fix, but this is the worst upgrade experience I've ever had.

You can google it all you want...but if you think that represents all users, you're fooling yourself. The vast majority simply don't have your problem(s). Goggle on how many finally left it alone and then found things working fine...
it's a Snow Leopard phenomenon
Really? Spotlight works fine for me - I raise a glass to how well
and it's a bug.
File a serious report, post your followups and be happy.

The Spotlight Feature Keeps Indexing

How do I sto the SPOTLIGHT feature to stop indexing?

Mike...
Several ways to do this > Turning Off Spotlight | Mac Tricks And Tips

"Spotlight" has been "indexing backup volume" for hours

I have been having some problems with making a backup to Time Capsule using Time Machine, but it finally was resolved (after a very long prep time). Now, "Spotlight" shows a message that it is indexing the Backup volume (icon for backup value stays on the desktop)and estimating the backup time, but no time ever showed. I went to Console to see what messages were being posted and saw many messages as follows:
8/5/08 1:45:28 PM /System/Library/CoreServices/backupd[185] Waiting for Spotlight to finish indexing /Volumes/Backup of Barbara Klein’s MacBook/Backups.backupdb
Now spotlight is finished estimating and telling me that the estimated time is about 70 hours to index (and rising)!! Can anyone tell me what is going on? Or what, if anything I should do? If I turn off the computer, won't it simply start that indexing again when a backup happens?
Help would be appreciated!

I have done that, so I will see what happens next! Putting the Time Capsule and the backup volume on the privacy list seemed to shorten the time to 7 minutes! And now the indexing has stopped. Whether this will be an issue if I am ever looking for something on the backup volume is a question, I suppose.
Thanks for the tip.
Barbara

TS1702 how do you stop itunes from downloading apps over and over again and again like for ever it wont stop help.

how do you stop itunes from downloading apps over and over again and again like for ever it wont stop help.
i tryed everything i can in the setting and so on , i even clicked on the downloads arrow to pause it and delete them but like i said it will now stop.
theres apps i just dont want. theres a list of them but theres not a place were i can get rid of them. it also says some stuff about icloud yeah right like i have ios 5 or 7 ha . pod touch 2 is what i have lol . plz help thanks.

to the right by search library theres an arrow there click on it : it will show you what it is downloading , from there you can pause and select all and delete them but still will continue to download them if you tell itunes to check for downloads. that download engien is crazy i tell yeah.
no matter what we do it will still download them trust me i tryed everything and i also went to icloud to see if it was there but to what i see is that there is no apps there this is some crazy itune program that needs to remade.

TS1543 my mac wont stop at single user it continues to root, how can i get to single user to enter info needed to reset password

I my mac wont recognise my password, i have tried to reset password using single user but my mac wont stop at single user it just continues to root, how do i get it to stop at single user so i can add info needed to reset password?

Are your sure that wasn't a Verbose boot (Cmd-V) you were trying? That would go on to a regular boot.
Try a PRAM Reset, then try the single user, Cmd-S, at the startup chime. For the PRAM Reset, hold down Option - Cmd - P - R all together until it chimes a total of three times, then let go to finish booting.

Spotlight wont stop indexing

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for