How to mount Amazon S3 bucket as a Windows Drive

From this tutorial you will learn how to mount an Amazon S3 bucket as a Network Drive under Windows (or how to map an Amazon S3 bucket as a Windows Drive).

First of all you need to download and install TntDrive.

The following window appears when you start TntDrive:

This is the main application window. It shows all mapped drives and lets you add new mapped drives or edit existing drives.

To Add a New Mapped Drive

Click Add New Mapped Drive. The corresponding dialog will open:

1. Choose the storage account

   TntDrive supports various storage types, please choose the storage account you want to work with. If you are adding the first drive, you need to add the storage account first.

2. Select an Amazon S3 bucket to map

   Click on the folder icon to get the bucket list from the storage and choose the desired bucket and optional path. You may also enter the bucket name and path manually.

   If you do not have any buckets on your account or need to create a new one, type the bucket name in the corresponding text box and TntDrive will offer to create it.

   You may also specify an optional directory/subdirectory after the bucket name.

   Special note for IAM users: if the credentials do not have s3:ListAllMyBuckets permission, enter an existing bucket name manually. TntDrive checks the selected bucket using s3:ListBucket; if this check is denied, you can ignore the error and add the drive anyway. Creating a new bucket requires s3:CreateBucket.

3. Specify Mapped Drive Letter

   This letter will be assigned to the mapped drive.

4. Click Add new drive

Your Amazon S3 bucket will appear in This PC.

Additional Drive Properties

You may also specify additional drive properties when adding a new drive or editing an existing one. Click the advanced properties.. link located at the bottom-left corner of the dialog.

Mapped Drive

Mount as Network Drive - the mapped drive will appear as a network drive. It will be available to other computers only if Allow access from local network is enabled.

Allow access from local network - turn this option on if you would like to make the mapped drive visible over the local network.

Mount as Removable Drive - the mapped drive will appear as a removable drive and it will be visible only to users of the local system.

There are some differences in how Windows handles network drives and removable drives. It sends fewer requests to a network drive. Windows is also more tolerant to delays when a network drive is used. So, the Network Drive type is recommended.

Mount as read-only media - mount the Amazon S3 bucket in a read-only mode.

Drive label - you may change the auto-generated drive label. A TntDrive Service restart is required if you change this setting.

Storage

Default Storage Class - allows you to select which storage class will be automatically applied to files you upload via TntDrive. This setting applies only to new files uploaded through this mapped drive. It does not change the storage class of existing objects.

The following storage classes are supported:

• STANDARD - Standard storage class.
• STANDARD_IA - Standard Infrequent Access storage class (cheaper than Standard but has some limitations, see the AWS website for more details).
• ONEZONE_IA - Amazon S3 One Zone-IA (Infrequent Access) Storage Class (designed to be used to store data that does not need the extra level of protection provided by geographic redundancy).
• GLACIER - Amazon S3 Glacier Flexible Retrieval storage class for archive data that does not require immediate access. Objects must be restored before they can be read; retrieval typically takes from minutes to 12 hours. A 90-day minimum storage duration and retrieval charges apply.
• GLACIER_IR - Amazon S3 Glacier Instant Retrieval storage class for rarely accessed data that still requires millisecond access. A 90-day minimum storage duration, a 128 KB minimum billable object size, and retrieval charges apply.
• DEEP_ARCHIVE - Amazon S3 Glacier Deep Archive storage class for long-term archive data that is rarely accessed. Objects must be restored before they can be read; retrieval typically takes from 9 to 48 hours. A 180-day minimum storage duration and retrieval charges apply.
• INTELLIGENT_TIERING - storage class for data with changing or unknown access patterns. Objects start in the Frequent Access tier, move to Infrequent Access after 30 days without access, and to Archive Instant Access after 90 days without access. When an object is accessed, it moves back to Frequent Access. Optional Archive Access and Deep Archive Access tiers are configured separately in Amazon S3; this TntDrive setting does not enable them.

Important: TntDrive does not initiate archive restores. Restore objects stored in GLACIER or DEEP_ARCHIVE before opening them from the mapped drive. Objects stored in GLACIER_IR remain available for real-time access.

Enable Server Side Encryption - explicitly adds the x-amz-server-side-encryption: AES256 header to uploads and requests SSE-S3 with Amazon S3-managed keys. Amazon S3 already encrypts all new uploads with SSE-S3 by default. This option does not enable SSE-KMS or customer-provided keys.

Enable Transfer Acceleration - uses Amazon S3 accelerated endpoint for file uploads and downloads when Transfer Acceleration is enabled for the bucket. Bucket names containing periods are not supported. Performance depends on distance and network conditions, and additional AWS charges may apply.

Enable Requester Pays access - sends the x-amz-request-payer: requester header with each request. Enable this option when accessing a Requester Pays bucket as a requester. The AWS account associated with your credentials pays request and data-download charges, while the bucket owner continues to pay storage charges.

Caching

Enable file information caching - if enabled, file information will be cached in memory and used for further requests. Using this option, you can reduce the number of requests sent to the server.

You may need to disable this option when working with the same files from multiple locations.

Cached file information is valid for the period specified by the Limit time to live of cached items option described below.

Enable directory listing caching - if enabled, directory listings will be cached in memory and used for further requests. Using this option, you can reduce the number of requests sent to the server.

You may need to disable this option when working with the same directories from multiple locations.

Cached directory listings are valid for the period specified by the Limit time to live of cached items option described below.

Cache the READ requests for files smaller than - caches requested file blocks when the file size does not exceed the limit specified in the dialog.

The local disk is used to keep the cached data. You may configure the cache location under Tools > Options > Advanced.

Cached file blocks are valid for the period specified by the Limit time to live of cached items option described below.

Enable prefetching of files smaller than - if enabled, TntDrive will download and cache the entire file when the first READ request is received. The cached file will be used for all further READ requests. Use this setting to specify the maximum file size to prefetch.

The local disk is used to keep the file. You may configure the cache location under Tools > Options > Advanced.

The cached file is valid for the period specified by the Limit time to live of cached items option described below.

Limit size of cached READ requests on the disk - this option lets you limit the disk space used by cached READ requests and prefetched files. Use the value specified in the dialog as the maximum allowed cache size.

Limit time to live of cached items - specifies how long the cached data remains valid. If the time interval between the time the item was cached and the current time is greater than the value specified in the dialog, a fresh copy will be requested from the server.

Please note that TntDrive does not update the cache if a file/directory was changed outside of the mapped drive. You may use the following command to reset the cache manually: Drives > [Drive] > Reset cache...

You may also reset the cache from the command line interface.