whenever I want to go to a file, the computer always starts me off in some strange place called owner files. Is there a way to get Windows to start off my search where I want to begin? It takes a bit longer to get where I need to be under the current system. Ideas?

You need to be more specific. What version of Windows? Are you going through Start > Search? If so, you can change the search options.

Originally Posted by Digerati

Are you going through Start > Search? If so, you can change the search options.

To build, it is a drop down box on the left margin. Just select the location based on the options provided. Also, you can open up any folder and in the top navigation bar, there is a search button that will automatically search that folder as its default location.

This is a good question, after all.
It's been always annoying to me, that when you start search from within Windows Explorer, it'll only look in just opened folder, unless you change search location.
I looked for some crack to change it, but to no avail.
Now, I don't remember, how it was in previous Windows versions, but in Vista, when I go Start>Search, it'll search everywhere.

It's been always annoying to me, that when you start search from within Windows Explorer, it'll only look in just opened folder

Hmm, I think that's how it should be. If you want to look deeper, you move up the directory/folder tree to the root of the drive. If you start your search from My Computer (either by right clicking on My Computer, or by opening My Computer and clicking search) it will search all your drives. That makes sense to me. If I think something is in a particular folder, I don't want it searching all over the place for that item - I want it to search that folder. If it can't find it, I'll step back and start a wider search. That part works correctly.

And Vista and XP behave the same when going through Start > Search - it searches all drives (same as right-clicking on My Computer), unless you change the options.

If I think something is in a particular folder, I don't want it searching all over the place for that item

You have a reason here...

Originally Posted by broni

You have a reason here...

Yeah - especially if you have 100s of gigabytes in 1000s of files on multiple drives to search through.