When comparing Instant File Find vs GrepWin, the Slant community recommends GrepWin for most people. In the question“What are the best Windows tools for finding files?” GrepWin is ranked 7th while Instant File Find is ranked 13th. The most important reason people chose GrepWin is:
GrepWin is completely free and open source. It's released under GPL.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Can save an index for for later use
If you want to index a NAS that is not always online, you can do it once, save the database, and load it as and when needed.
Pro So fast
Pro Low CPU usage
Pro Instant!
Pro Free and open source
GrepWin is completely free and open source. It's released under GPL.
Pro RegEx support
Pro Portable Version
A portable version without installation is available.
Pro Can search hidden directories/files
GrepWin can also search for hidden directories or files with no problem.
Cons
Con Can only search .txt files
Con No way to export the results
If one wishes to export the results from grep
into a text file or any other format, there's no way to do it with GrepWin.