The Crippled Server
Windows 11 relies on the “Windows Search Indexer” to make finding files nearly instantaneous. This service constantly runs in the background, scanning drives and building a massive database of file names, contents, and metadata. While highly effective for local SSDs, it becomes a major problem when dealing with Network Attached Storage (NAS) or remote file servers. By default, Windows may attempt to automatically index mapped network drives. This forces your local computer to constantly pull data across the network, saturating your bandwidth, putting unnecessary strain on the remote server’s hard drives, and often causing your local File Explorer to freeze while it waits for the remote indexing to catch up.
Excluding Remote Storage
To preserve your network bandwidth and stop Windows 11 from automatically indexing network drives, you must explicitly exclude those remote locations from the Search Indexer’s purview.
Press the Windows Key, type Indexing Options, and hit Enter. This will open the classic Control Panel dialogue box for search settings. In this window, you will see a list of “Included Locations.” Click the Modify button at the bottom. A new “Indexed Locations” window will appear, displaying a hierarchical tree of all your drives and folders. Look through the list in the top half of the window for any mapped network drives (e.g., “Z: Shared_Data”). If there is a checkmark next to the network drive, click the box to uncheck it. Click OK to close the modify window, and then Close on the main menu. Windows will immediately drop the network drive from its database and cease all background scanning over the network.