Startpage finds most of what I need for general, casual searching, but Google is admittedly better...with a total lack of privacy. I would never search anything on Google if I was logged in to Google or YouTube during that browser session. Granted, they can track my IP address, so I'm probably deluding myself.
I thought about going 100% to Tor to keep companies like Google at bay, but UHND doesn't seem to load in tor, which is a big issue for me...obviously. Plus, I worry that Tor is used by criminals and so may draw attention, so I've thought about forking over some bucks for a VPN. Why make the authorities think I'm hiding something from them?