Mac Finder cant search external HD

[MrEco99]

Ive tried everything (except the thing that works)
On Catalina 10.15.7
Its APFS, 5Tb external seagate drive, used for data only, not Time Machine.
Tried First aid, no problems, its fairly new drive, works fine.
Tried adding it to the "Prevent Spotlight searching", closing, then opening it and removing it to get it to reindex. But spotlight doesn't seem to indicate is reindexing at all (not visually anyway)
Finder will not find a single thing on this drive

Also ive tried mdutil -s /Volumes/<your_disk_name>/ which says disabled, and sudo mdutil -i on /Volumes/<your_disk_name>/ doesnt make any difference, its still disabled.

Ive just tested it on Commander One (like Finder) and i can search it fine there.

Didnt get any replies on the Apple discussions, so had to look elsewhere and found this great place.

 

[MacInWin]

Welcome to the forum!

Can you say how you are searching in Finder? Are you using the search function in the upper right corner of the window? Spotlight doesn't have an indicator that it is indexing. You can open Utilities/Activity Monitor and look for instances of "mds" or daughter processes running (mds, mdsworker, mds_stores). If they aren't drawing any CPU time, they aren't indexing. Does Finder open the drive and display the contents at all? Do any other "search" applications work (EasyFind, Find Any File are two to try)?

It is definitely NOT the OS itself, as I have successfully searched many times on Catalina and now do so on Big Sur. As a long shot, was this drive cloned from the internal? Does Disk Utility show one Volume only on the drive, or are there multiple Volumes?

 

[MrEco99]

Hi
Thanks for the fast reply. lots of good questions.
Yes using the search function in the upper right.
Yes finder works fine on this drive (except search), perfectly accessible.
Yes as i said 'Commander one" (a 3rd party file access programme) works fine, searches the drive and everything perfectly (but i dont like it)
Finder searches all drives fine, except this particular external drive.
The drive isnt a clone, it was just formatted APFS, and then i dump files on it (or use superduper to backup files to it)
The mds processes running are...
mds
mds_stores
Disc Utility shows...
External
-Seagate OneTouch HDD Media
--Container disk4
---SBP BackupHD
---SBP BackupHD - Data
(ive now learnt about the two volumes apple make)

I just attached another USB external drive and finder isnt searching that either.

When i say 'not searching' i mean i selected the drive in Finder, and in teh upper right search box type something in like t or tree, something that i know it should find.

Finder searches my internal SSD fine.

 

[krs]

I have given up on spotlight years ago.
Spotlight wouldn't even find files that were right in front of me on the screen.

I have been using Find any File, works very well and quite fast - best money for an application I ever spent

 

[MrEco99]

UPDATE
I read that it can be fixed by installing Seagates Paragon driver, so did that, enabled permissions. and when i use the paragon software to view the drives and click on my seagate drive, i have options (tick boxes) one of them is "Enable spotlight indexing" , so i tick that, and 1 second later it UNTICKS itself. So it seems like i cant tick that.
If i click on a different drive (internal or a flash card ive got permanently plugged in) they all have that optioned ticked fine

 

[MrEco99]

Ive just tried

sudo mdutil -i on "/Volumes/Seagate Backup Plus Drive"

/System/Volumes/Data/Volumes/Seagate Backup Plus Drive:
And it returns
" Indexing and searching disabled."

 

[MacInWin]

Ok, there are a couple of things going on. The two Volumes you found in Disk Utility are merged by Finder into one displayed device. What Apple did was to put the System files on the "Macintosh HD" drive, and that got cloned by Super Duper to the SBP BackupHD. That Volume has /System, /Applications and /Library on it. Then it created a second Volume, named "Macintosh HD - Data" that got cloned by SD to "SBP BackupHD - Data." And that is where your files, that you want searched, are located. What makes it difficult is that SBP BackupHD is, like the source drive, read-only and secured to be available only to the system. Apple did that for security of the OS. And that may be the reason you cannot change the mdutil settings on the merged volume, or on the direct system volume at all.

I'm on Big Sur, not Catalina, but I think in System Preferences, Security and Privacy, under the Privacy tab there is one option for "Full Disk Access" and another for "Files and Folders." If you click the lock icon and give an administrator password, you can add applications and processes that can have access to the data. Try adding mds to the list to see if that lets Spotlight index the drive. I don't know if that will work or if it will fix things, but it's worth trying.

Is your account a Standard user or an Admin account? It may be that to search that drive for Finder, you have to be an Admin. That's speculation, too. I never had problems with Finder finding things on my backup clones, but then I'm an Admin account so I wouldn't expect to have any issues.

 

[MrEco99]

yes i know about the 'merging', learnt that a few weeks back when i did a fresh install of Catalina (used to be on Mojave).
In privacy file and folder, you cant add anything, (the plus and minus are greyed out), but you can tick or untick anything thats already in there.
In privacy Full disk access, i cant find anything called mds to add.
I am the admin user
I have actually got one of the seagate drives to now work!!!!
I read something else that said, delete the file called .metadata_never_index in the root of the drive. did that rebooted and it works, and in teh seagate paragon software, "Enable spotlight indexing is now ticked.
BUT on my other seagate drive i dont have that file to delete. DOH

I wonder if i just cant see that file on the other drive, seeming as apple 'hide' stuff.
-Seagate OneTouch HDD Media
--Container disk4
---SBP BackupHD
---SBP BackupHD - Data

I can only see ---SBP BackupHD

 

[MacInWin]

OK, now I'm stumped. Maybe somebody else can help out here. I used Find Any File and found three instances of .metadata_never_index on my boot drive, all in the /Library folder and all associated with some application I had installed. Nothing in the root of the drive at all.

 

[MrEco99]

TBH it might have been something else i did, but nothing obvious.
would you expect this command

sudo mdutil -i on "/volumes/SBP BackupHD"

To return

Indexing and searching disabled.

By the way, this was the article for .metadata

Spotlight reports "Indexing and searching disabled" in Lion

Lion keeps "losing track" of Spotlight information. Directories and Applications disappear, full text searches stop working, etc. I seem to need to re-index it once a week or so. However, now it

apple.stackexchange.com

 

[MacInWin]

Maybe, if it has to write anything on the drive to set that. Apple has restricted write access to the system only and on Big Sur stepped it up by encrypting the Volume as well. Does the command work when issued against SBP Backup HD - Data? That's what you want indexed anyway.

 

[MrEco99]

ok i have found a file called /Volumes/SBP BackupHD - Data/.metadata_never_index_unless_rootfs
but i cant delete it.

I get the same result with sudo mdutil -i on "/volumes/SBP BackupHD - Data"

 

[MacInWin]

Well, at least we know why it's not indexing. Maybe time to call Apple support? Or do an internet search on that particular file name? I found this article that says something about using touch on the file to allow searching in Mail back from when Catalina was still in beta. https://mrmacintosh.com/apple-releases-fifth-beta-of-macos-catalina-10-15-19a526h-beta-5/

And this was on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/MacOS/comments/d5r0ac
Note in that second reference a command to force a reindex. Might give that a go.

 

[MrEco99]

Thanks for all your efforts, much appreciated.
I cant phone apple support, they want an arm and a leg even for a chat.
ive tried

rm -rf "/Volumes/SBP BackupHD - Data/.metadata_never_index_unless_rootfs"
But it says permission denied.

Tried this

sudo rm -R "/Volumes/SBP BackupHD - Data/.metadata_never_index_unless_rootfs"

didnt give me a permissions error

 

[MrEco99]

Well im pleased to report SBP BackupHD volume now has the "Enable spotlight indexing" ticked in the paragon seagate software. I think we fixed it !!!
Thank you so much

 

[MacInWin]

Yep, the first Volume is read-only except to the system and the second is read/write to users, even sudo.

And if you want Apple support, go in through the operating system options at Apple. If you have a current version they will support it, no matter how old the machine is. I think Catalina is still considered "current" and so available for support. If you go in with your hardware information you'll get to the "pay wall." But go to Apple.com, click on the "Support" button on the top bar, Click on the Mac icon, scroll down until you see the "macOS" button, click it and at the bottom is "Get Support..."

 

[MacInWin]

Well im pleased to report SBP BackupHD volume now has the "Enable spotlight indexing" ticked in the paragon seagate software. I think we fixed it !!!
Thank you so much

YOU fixed it. Well done. I was just nearby.

 

[spillahcrown]

This is the best advice I've seen on this issue and, I've been searching for about a week.

I also have this issue and am completely at my wits-end. I have an OWC enclosure containing a 4TB RAID array. It's connected to the Mac Pro via TB which SHOULD give it SATA-like connection.

OWC Mercury Elite Pro Dual RAID External Drive

The perfect external storage solution for any backup, A/V, photography, or data management. Plug & Play ready for RAID 0, 1, span, & independent modes.

www.owcdigital.com

I've used this drive for YEARS and just recently upgraded to CATALINA and now BOOM. No search capabilities whatsover on ANY external device.

- I've tried the SPOTLIGHT trick - NOTHING
- I've tried ALL the TERMINAL suggestions - NOTHING. Drive comes back as SEARCH AND INDEXING DISABLED
- I've zapped the PRAM and all that good stuff too - NOTHING

Is this an OS thing? Do I need to use a 3rd party search tool?

Please. Help.