Some deliver results faster than others. Some allow you to search both the Web and Newsgroups. Still others allow you to use multiple search engines simultaneously. With some of the more common search engines described here. Some will provide better results in some topics that others.
Indexes are basically lists of related sites, usually organized by topic.
They usually follow a hierarchy of broad topics, followed by increasingly narrow sub-topics. Indexes can be particularly helpful when you want to start your search at a broad level to explore what's available in your topic of interest. The best indexes are annotated, i.e., they include a short description of the site they reference. This allows you to scan a list of sites for potential relevance before launching your browser to retrieve the site. One of the most established and best known is Yahoo .