Is Google actually the best search engine?

Blisterman

I've just realised that, in the past decade, I have pretty much never given any other search engine a go. Google is just my default choice, as it is for most people. It's even a verb.

But thinking about it, it's not even that good. For most terms, about 90% of the results are either people trying to sell you stuff, or pages with barely any link to the topic you've searched for beyond the name. To actually find information usually takes several attempts at trying out different phrases and keywords. It's irritating. If I was actually looking to buy something, I'd use the shopping search, or add "for sale" to my search term.

So has anyone here have any experience of other search engines? Is Bing actually better? Yahoo? Is Altavista still going? Are there others?

Mr Benevolent

Bing is better for images, Clusty is better for research and Wolfram is better for maths nerds.

FatherLen

it's better than ask jeeves, bing and yahoo.
What else is there?

Amirani

It is the best in my opinion. Some good comparisons here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_search_engines

DrumSteve

Give dogpile a go?

Anyone

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=is+google+the+best+search+engine

Duggy747

Altavista for downloading .wavs, this new thing called mp3s, and potato-pixel videos back in the day :pac:

Jaysus, I remember when Altavista was the bees knees.

hooradiation

Blisterman wrote: »

But thinking about it, it's not even that good. For most terms, about 90% of the results are either people trying to sell you stuff, or pages with barely any link to the topic you've searched for beyond the name.

I think you're doing it wrong.

Cavehill Red

Duckduckgo automatically routes to a secure page and doesn't track your IP address.
Which is a consideration people who are concerned about personal security might wish to bear in mind.

Mr Benevolent

Cavehill Red wrote: »

Duckduckgo automatically routes to a secure page and doesn't track your IP address.
Which is a consideration people who are concerned about personal security might wish to bear in mind.

Yeah, in a year's time all you'll hear is 'Ah just duckduckgo it.'

Not.

What a fucking stupid name.

danniemcq

Mr Benevolent wrote: »

Bing is better for images, Clusty is better for research and Wolfram is better for maths nerds.

Porn, Bing is best for porn....


or so i hear

Cavehill Red

Mr Benevolent wrote: »

Yeah, in a year's time all you'll hear is 'Ah just duckduckgo it.'

Not.

What a fucking stupid name.

What does the name matter? 'Google' isn't exactly the most edifying or elegant names either.

Orim

Cavehill Red wrote: »

What does the name matter? 'Google' isn't exactly the most edifying or elegant names either.

It's quick and easy to say though. Allowing for the "just google it" statement which was the point.

the groutch

AskJeeves is the best by a mile.

o1s1n

Dónal wrote: »

Jaysus, I remember when Altavista was the bees knees.

Hotbot was where it was at!

desertcircus

What are you searching for that's returning poor results? Google's usually able to get me what I need in the first three or four links...

TouchingVirus

Unless what you want is hosted on netload/rapidshare etc :pac:

ScumLord

I always find google knows exactly what I'm looking for. Its so good at it I wonder if its reading my other tabs for clues. I found Bing bad for local searches.

mike65

since google ****ed up the image search I've been using it less!

Lord Nikon

mike65 wrote: »

since google ****ed up the image search I've been using it less!

Definitely, it's a big pile of poo now. Can't search by size, when i click and image it brings up a website and not the image bigger, which is what's it should be doing.

wilson10

Blisterman wrote: »

I've just realised that, in the past decade, I have pretty much never given any other search engine a go. Google is just my default choice, as it is for most people. It's even a verb.

But thinking about it, it's not even that good. For most terms, about 90% of the results are either people trying to sell you stuff, or pages with barely any link to the topic you've searched for beyond the name. To actually find information usually takes several attempts at trying out different phrases and keywords. It's irritating. If I was actually looking to buy something, I'd use the shopping search, or add "for sale" to my search term.

So has anyone here have any experience of other search engines? Is Bing actually better? Yahoo? Is Altavista still going? Are there others?

Just Googled it and it says "Yes it is"

Orim

Lord Nikon wrote: »

Definitely, it's a big pile of poo now. Can't search by size, when i click and image it brings up a website and not the image bigger, which is what's it should be doing.

What googleimages are you using? The image search does all of those things when I use it.

Cavehill Red

Orim wrote: »

It's quick and easy to say though. Allowing for the "just google it" statement which was the point.

Actually, I though the point of the OP was to ask which SE was best, not which was the quickest to say out loud.

Ruu

Lycos. They're coming back, you'll see!

mike65

The main problem with images is they dropped "similar to" feature and terms have to be so specific as to be useless for a general query.

Irish Guitarist

Yahoo! image search has pretty much the same results as Google except they're all on one page. Google does the same but you can scroll to the bottom of the page and click on 'switch to basic view'. Having hundreds or thousands of results on one page is just too confusing for me.

Do a Google search for 'askew' by the way.

Dyr

Hmm..google change their image search results and suddenly people are asking about alternate search tools...

goodgolfer64

stock market say so....

uch

www.Doogle.org

mike65

Irish Guitarist wrote: »

Do a Google search for 'askew' by the way.

its askew! Hilarious, who says google have no sense of humour

Amirani

mike65 wrote: »

its askew! Hilarious, who says google have no sense of humour

Also try searching "Do A Barrel Roll"

And my personal favourite - search for "recursion".

Gosub

uch wrote: »

www.Doogle.org

Funny as Feck

humbert

I don't like the level of "personalisation" and changing safe search to be something you can't switch off is a bit too much like censorship.

Tried duckduckgo for a while but I'd be better off going around the neighbourhood knocking on doors.

Legs.Eleven

NERDS!!

Luckycharms_74

Legs.Eleven wrote: »

NERDS!!

Don't you mean this

Capt'n Midnight

Does Bing still use Google ?
http://www.bing.com/search?q=mbzrxpgjys&go=&qs=bs&form=QBRE&filt=all

Also this
http://thenextweb.com/google/2013/04/11/surprise-bing-is-five-times-better-than-google-at-finding-malware/

the study found Google is five times better than Bing and 10 times better than Yandex at keeping malware out of search results.
...
You shouldn’t feel any less safe using Yandex or Bing rather than Google. Still, the results do show just how much effort Google puts into search.

Gorilla Rising

I use Google. I think it's still by far the best?

I will never ever ever use anything to do with Yahoo! Horrible homepage. Ads and crap everywhere. It doesn't know what it wants to be.

764dak

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Does Bing still use Google ?
http://www.bing.com/search?q=mbzrxpgjys&go=&qs=bs&form=QBRE&filt=all

Also this
http://thenextweb.com/google/2013/04/11/surprise-bing-is-five-times-better-than-google-at-finding-malware/

I must have bad luck since I found malware easier with Google compared to Bing.

schnitzelEater

I asked Jeeves, he reckons Bing is best, and he would hardly lie to me, now would he?

CrazyRabbit

Lord Nikon wrote: »

Definitely, it's a big pile of poo now. Can't search by size, when i click and image it brings up a website and not the image bigger, which is what's it should be doing.

For some reason, Google do a good job of hiding their Advanced search pages.

http://www.google.com/advanced_image_search

Eathrin

Bing is crap imo.
Google is the best and if that means tracking my web preferences, then so be it.

arybvtcw0eolkf

Blisterman wrote: »

But thinking about it, it's not even that good.

Believe it or not I use it (google) for boards.ie searches before I use the search engine here on this site.

Outside of boards.ie searches I haven't used another in years but I'm gonna start today

Sulla Felix

Blisterman wrote: »

But thinking about it, it's not even that good. For most terms, about 90% of the results are either people trying to sell you stuff, or pages with barely any link to the topic you've searched for beyond the name. To actually find information usually takes several attempts at trying out different phrases and keywords. It's irritating.

Ahh, the search-fu is weak with this one. Try harda, grasshoppa.

chakotha

Orim wrote: »

What googleimages are you using? The image search does all of those things when I use it.

It keeps freezing my Firefox for some reason.

Standard Toaster

http://search.oceanfree.net

Don’t you just miss the dial-up modem noise?
EEEEEEEE-OOOOOO-EEEEEE-OOOOOO-GHGHGHGHGHGHHGHGHGHG

john_cappa

Google is so far ahead it is not funny.

soggy biscuit

gizoogle.net is a bit of craic.....

..... if you're into that sort of thing :eek:

upandcumming

http://www.gizoogle.net/

upandcumming

soggy biscuit wrote: »

gizoogle.net is a bit of craic.....

..... if you're into that sort of thing :eek:

Ah **** ya!

uch

Standard Toaster wrote: »

http://search.oceanfree.net

Don’t you just miss the dial-up modem noise?
EEEEEEEE-OOOOOO-EEEEEE-OOOOOO-GHGHGHGHGHGHHGHGHGHG

Handshaking that were called