About two months ago, I began using Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, which I absolutely love. Microsoft has really done great things with this program over the years, although I must admit there are a few things I would change if I could. I also use Google Desktop, which enables me to index and search my entire computer, including e-mails, PDF files, and many other previously search-obscure file types. This is not unlike Microsoft’s solution which is called Instant Search. Microsoft Instant Search indexes files in a similar way, but I find that it hogs more resources and is generally not as good as Google Desktop.

In Outlook, Microsoft promotes this product relentlessly and does not provide a friendly way to remove the notifications; however, I finally came across a way to rid Outlook of these annoying messages.  Following the steps listed below will remove all Instant Search notifications from Outlook:

1. Open the Tools menu, and click Options.
2. Select the Other tab, and click Advanced Options.

   

3. In the General settings section (first), the last item is Show prompts to enable Instant Search.  Make sure this box is left unchecked.

   

4. Click OK, and then OK again to get back to the main Outlook screen.

While this works for Microsoft Office Outlook 2007, I cannot confirm it will work on Outlook 2003 and below.  If anyone has experience with doing this on ’03 and below, please feel free to post directions.