How can I automate monthly file counting across a server?

You might want to just run your script and time it! Get-ChildItem isn't the fastest, especially when scanning the whole C: drive, so expect it to take a while. ?

For quick file counts, you could dump the Master File Table (MFT) instead of scanning the entire filesystem; it’s way faster. Here's a GitHub link to a tool that might help: Mft2Csv.

Try using System.IO.Directory's GetFiles method instead! It's generally more efficient than Get-ChildItem because it doesn't convert files into objects. Here’s a quick example you can tweak:

```powershell
$Path = "C:"
$Filter = "*859*"
$OutFile = "C:LogfileLocation.txt"
$EnumerationOptions = [System.IO.EnumerationOptions]::new()
$EnumerationOptions.IgnoreInaccessible = $True
$EnumerationOptions.RecurseSubdirectories = $True
[System.IO.Directory]::GetFiles($Path, $Filter, $EnumerationOptions) | Out-File $OutFile
```

Have you considered using an indexing tool like Everything? It's super quick and has command-line options for searching files, which could save you a lot of time! Check it out [here](https://www.voidtools.com/support/everything/).

If your directories remain unchanged, why not create an array with the paths and iterate through those? This can significantly speed things up as you won't need to search all of C: recursively every time.