Magento 2.0 Installation with MySQL 5.5 – Step-by-Step Guide

I had the same problem. I had to downgrade back to mysql 5.5 for it to work.

I narrowed the problem down to this query when searching by name which returns no results because it doesn't match the word:

select
    e.*,
    price_index.price,
    price_index.final_price,
    IF(price_index.tier_price IS NOT NULL, LEAST(price_index.min_price, price_index.tier_price), price_index.min_price) as minimal_price,
    price_index.min_price,
    price_index.max_price,
    price_index.tier_price,
    cat_index.position as cat_index_position
from
    catalog_product_entity as e
inner join
    catalog_product_index_price as price_index
    on (price_index.entity_id = e.entity_id AND price_index.website_id = '1' AND price_index.customer_group_id = 0)
inner join
    catalog_category_product_index as cat_index on (cat_index.product_id=e.entity_id AND cat_index.store_id='1' AND cat_index.visibility IN(3, 4) AND cat_index.category_id='2')
where
    (e.entity_id IN
        (SELECT
            t1.entity_id
        FROM
            catalog_product_entity_varchar AS t1
        LEFT JOIN
            catalog_product_entity_varchar AS t2
            ON t1.entity_id = t2.entity_id
            AND t1.attribute_id = t2.attribute_id
            AND t2.store_id=1
        WHERE
            (t1.store_id = 0)
        AND
            (t1.attribute_id = 60)
        AND
            (t1.entity_id = price_index.entity_id)
        AND
            (IF(t2.value_id>0, t2.value, t1.value) LIKE '%gift%')
        )
    );

Near the end the IF(t2.value_id>0, t2.value, t1.value) doesn't seem to return anything when t2.value_id and t2.value are NULL, if I change it to IF(t1.value_id>0, t1.value, t1.value), it worked.

You can construct the query that is being used for your advanced search by putting:

var_dump($this->getSearchModel()->getProductCollection());
die();

in getResultCount() from app\code\local\Mage\CatalogSearch\Block\Advanced\Result.php

Then looking in the _parts section

Yes, you can. Assuming you open the connection with something like this:

$db = Mage::getSingleton('core/resource')->getConnection('core_read');

You can close the connection with this:

$db->closeConnection();

And then re-open it with this:

$db->getConnection();

When I need to make an api call that could take a long time, I close the connection first, then use getConnection to open it again afterwards, which has solved the "mysql server has gone away" problem for me.