CS Browser FAQ

The Pro version is faster than the Freeware version because of better multi-threading support.

The speed depends on many factors, such as your internet connection, your hardware configuration, the number of files and their size, the distance to the Amazon S3 server, and the server load.

You can expect the Pro version to be faster than the Freeware version, but the exact speed depends on the factors mentioned above.

CS Browser Pro is designed to utilize all available bandwidth provided by your Internet Service Provider.

Please use the following link to make your purchase:
https://s3browser.com/buypro.aspx

Select the required number of licenses and click Proceed to Checkout.

On the checkout page, select the desired payment method and follow the instructions to complete your order.

The price for 1 CS Browser Pro License is below:

Please use the following link to make your purchase:
https://sites.fastspring.com/netsdk/product/ea3d55048db0

If you would like to obtain a formal invoice, please select Purchase Order as the payment method and follow the on-screen instructions to generate the invoice.

We are sorry for the inconvenience. Please try our alternative payment processor FastSpring

Please follow the steps below to convert Free version to Pro:

1. Start CS Browser Freeware
2. Click Help -> Activate Pro
3. Enter your activation key
4. Click "Activate"

Please follow the steps below to perform Offline Activation:

• Click Help, Activate Pro Version
• Double-click on the Key icon
• The Offline Activation window will open
• Follow the instructions to generate an activation request

Please follow the steps below to transfer your license to another PC:

1. Click Help -> Activate Pro Version on the first PC
2. Click "Deactivate Pro license on this computer"
3. Activate your license on another PC

If you would like to restore the key associated with the old machine, please open Help -> Activate Pro on the old PC and let us know your Hardware ID. We will recover the key.

CS Browser is licensed per machine. You need to obtain a license key for each PC.

We provide volume discounts for multi-license orders. You can find more details on the following page: https://s3browser.com/buypro.aspx

Please note that by default, the maintenance period starts from the purchase date. If you would like to purchase it before the expiration of your existing maintenance, please contact us once you complete your order, and we will adjust the dates accordingly.

Feel free to obtain the required number of CS Browser licenses for reselling or on behalf of your customer.

You may specify your contact details during the purchase, as the license is not bound to the purchaser.

The license is delivered immediately to the e-mail you specify during the purchase.

Thank you for your interest in our product.

We offer site licenses based on the number of computers you plan to use the product on.

Let us know the number of computers, and we will send you the link to the order page.

After your purchase is completed, we can issue a single license key that will cover multiple activations according to the number of seats you obtained.

We provide standard email support. The usual response time is within 24 hours from Monday to Friday.

Access Denied errors are returned by the storage when you are trying to access a bucket or file that you do not have permissions to access.

Please make sure you are using the correct access keys and that the keys have the necessary permissions to access the bucket.

Unfortunately, there is nothing to fix on our end; this is a permissions issue. Please check your credentials and permissions.

If you are working under a limited IAM account, please make sure you have access to the Amazon S3 API.

You may also generate a new set of keys using these instructions

This error is usually caused by an self-signed, expired or invalid SSL certificate.

Please ensure you are using the correct endpoint for your storage and that the certificate is valid and all intermediate certificates are installed on the client.

If you are using Amazon S3 compatible storage, please ensure the path style addressing model is selected:

1. Open Account properties, Advanced settings
2. Switch the Addressing model to Path style

You may also try to relax the certificate validation by following these steps:

1. Start CS Browser
2. Click Tools, Options
3. Go to the Advanced tab
4. Check Bypass SSL/TLS validation
5. Click Save

This error message is returned by the storage when you are trying to access a bucket that does not exist.

Please ensure you have specified the correct bucket name.

Please check your Access Key ID and Secret Access Key. Copy them directly from your AWS profile, ensuring there are no leading or trailing whitespaces.

You can also generate a new set of keys using these instructions: https://s3browser.com/aws-access-key-id-and-secret-access-key.aspx#create-iam-user-and-keys

According to the error message, invalid XML was received from the server.

The most common reason for this is a router or proxy requiring authentication. Please ensure you can access the internet from your browser.

Try opening Tools > Options > Connection and set the Proxy settings to Autodetect mode.

If you are working with Amazon S3 compatible storage, another possible reason could be an incorrect storage endpoint, causing it to return an HTML page instead of an XML storage response.

Network errors usually indicate issues with the Internet connection or temporary issues with the storage. Sometimes, it could be caused by Anti-Virus or Firewall software on your PC, or a hardware router that might need to be rebooted to fix the issue.

Try temporarily disabling any security software to see if it causes issues. If you are connected through a router, try rebooting it or disconnecting and reconnecting.

If you are working with Amazon S3 compatible storage, please ensure the correct endpoint is specified and accessible through the web browser.

Please open https://aws.amazon.com/s3 and sign up for Amazon S3.

The file should automatically combine when all parts are successfully downloaded. If it was not combined, it's possible that one of the parts was not downloaded correctly. You can check and restart any failed parts in the Tasks tab.

You may also want to consider increasing the number of retries on error and the delay between retries in Tools, Options, Logging and Error Handling, and then restart the download.

If you would like us to investigate this issue further, please reproduce the problem and send us a diagnostic report via Tools > Diagnostics. Thank you.

Your data is stored on the storage of your choice. CS Browser is simply a client program that helps you access your data from the storage you select.

CS Browser ensures that the data you work with is only sent to its intended destination, such as Amazon S3 or an Amazon S3 compatible storage endpoint. It does not redirect your data elsewhere.

Netsdk Software FZE does not have access to view the content or files you store or transfer to/from your Amazon S3 storage.

During new version checks or license activation/deactivation, the following data is sent to s3browser.com:

• Software version string (e.g., "9.5.5")
• CPU architecture ("x86" or "x64")
• Randomly generated installation ID
  (e.g., "1a79a4d60de6718e8e5b326e338ae533")
• MD5 hash of your License key
• Public IP address of the machine

All these transmissions are optional and can be disabled:

• New version checks can be turned off in Tools > Options > General
• There is an offline procedure for license key activation/deactivation.

When you add Amazon S3 credentials to CS Browser, you can choose to keep them in encrypted form: https://s3browser.com/aws-keys-encryption.aspx

CS Browser uses AES 256 to store your keys, which is a symmetric-key algorithm. Salt is used to make it harder to guess the key using a dictionary attack.

The encryption key (master password) is not stored in the program database. You will be asked for a password each time you open CS Browser.

Decrypted credentials are stored in the program memory, not on the disk. When you close the program, they are cleared automatically.

There is no way to restore your master password used to encrypt your Amazon S3 Credentials (Access Key ID and Secret Access Key): https://s3browser.com/aws-keys-encryption.aspx

You need to open Accounts, Accounts Manager and delete the old account you cannot access, and then add a new one: https://s3browser.com/amazon-s3-accounts.aspx

You will need to re-enter your Access Key and Secret Key. You can generate new access keys using these instructions: https://s3browser.com/aws-access-key-id-and-secret-access-key.aspx#create-iam-user-and-keys

It uses the following endpoints to access Amazon S3:

s3.dualstack.<region-code>.amazonaws.com - port 80 or 443

<bucket-name>.s3.dualstack.<region-code>.amazonaws.com - port 80 or 443

If you need AWS IP ranges, please check this link:
https://docs.aws.amazon.com/vpc/latest/userguide/aws-ip-ranges.html

To activate/deactivate the license, it needs access to s3browser.com at port 443

No, we do not have these certificates, sorry.

Although we haven't pursued formal certification, we strive to meet the high standards set by ISO27001 and other standard to ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of our information assets. Our focus remains on safeguarding our systems and data, and we continuously work towards strengthening our security practices in line with industry standards.

You can more details in our Security and Compliance FAQ:
https://s3browser.com/security-and-compliance-faq.aspx

There are a number of ways to share a bucket:

The easiest way is to use the Bucket Sharing Wizard:
https://s3browser.com/iam-bucket-sharing-wizard.aspx

From this help page, you can find more ways to share buckets:
https://s3browser.com/bucket-sharing-tutorial.aspx

Here is how newly created users can connect to the shared bucket:
https://s3browser.com/external-buckets-how-to-use-shared-bucket.aspx

You can use these instructions to learn how to make files public: https://s3browser.com/share-s3-bucket-edit-acls.aspx#make_files_public

Another approach is to use Bucket Policies to configure the bucket so that all existing and new files will be publicly available: https://s3browser.com/working-with-amazon-s3-bucket-policies.aspx

Please note, all buckets created after April 2023 are disabled from public access by default, meaning you are unable to make files public in buckets created after April 2023.

Please check out this help page to learn how to work around this: https://s3browser.com/how-to-restore-bucket-public-access.aspx

If you need automatic ACL modification during upload, please consider the following solution:

1. Click Tools, Default HTTP Headers

2. Add a new Default HTTP Header:

   • bucket name: <YOUR-BUCKET-NAME>
   • remote file name mask: *
   • header name: x-amz-acl
   • header value: public-read

3. Open Tools, Options, General and turn off the following options:

   • "Inherit permissions from parent bucket"
   • "Preserve permissions when overwriting existing files"

   Another approach is to use Bucket Policies to configure the bucket in a way that all existing and new files will be publicly available: https://s3browser.com/working-with-amazon-s3-bucket-policies.aspx

   Here is the bucket policy you can apply:

   {
     "Version": "2008-10-17",
     "Statement": [
       {
         "Sid": "AllowPublicRead",
         "Effect": "Allow",
         "Principal": {
           "AWS": "*"
         },
         "Action": [
           "s3:GetObject"
         ],
         "Resource": [
           "arn:aws:s3:::your_bucket_name/*"
         ]
       }
     ]
   }
   			

There is no way to move the bucket from one account to another or change the bucket ownership, as this feature is not supported by the Amazon S3 API.

However, you may try the following steps:

1. Account 1 grants access to the bucket to Account 2:
   https://s3browser.com/bucket-sharing-tutorial.aspx
2. Account 2 connects to the shared bucket using these instructions:
   https://s3browser.com/external-buckets-how-to-use-shared-bucket.aspx
3. Account 2 creates a new bucket and copies all files from the shared bucket to the newly created bucket:
   https://s3browser.com/news-3-2-5-release-notes.aspx#clone-s3-bucket

To create sub-accounts and share buckets/folders, your storage must support the Identity and Access Management (IAM) service.

You need to specify the IAM endpoint as described here: https://s3browser.com/s3-compatible-storage.aspx#custom-iam-endpoints

We are unsure if the storage you are working with supports IAM.

Please contact storage support to verify if the IAM service is supported, and if so, specify the IAM endpoint as described in the link above.

You can connect to s3 access point by using the alias: https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/access-points-alias.html

You may use the alias as a bucket name when adding the External Bucket

Here is the minimal IAM policy to allow access to a bucket for an IAM user:

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "s3:ListBucket",
        "s3:GetBucketLocation"
      ],
      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::sample-bucket",
      "Condition": {}
    },
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "s3:PutObject",
        "s3:GetObject",
        "s3:DeleteObject"
      ],
      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::sample-bucket/*",
      "Condition": {}
    }
  ]
}
			

Please replace sample-bucket with your bucket name.

Here is the minimal IAM policy to share a folder in a bucket with an IAM user:

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "s3:GetBucketLocation",
      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::sample-bucket",
      "Condition": {}
    },
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "s3:ListBucket",
      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::sample-bucket",
      "Condition": {
        "StringLike": {
          "s3:prefix": "sample-folder/*"
        }
      }
    },
    {
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": [
        "s3:PutObject",
        "s3:GetObject",
        "s3:DeleteObject"
      ],
      "Resource": "arn:aws:s3:::sample-bucket/sample-folder/*",
      "Condition": {}
    }
  ]
}
			

Please replace sample-bucket with your bucket name and sample-folder with your folder name.

Due to the distributed nature of Amazon S3, it may take up to 24 hours to completely propagate all changes among all servers. During this period, the bucket you deleted may reappear, and you may also be unable to create a bucket with the same name.

As you may already know, Amazon S3 does not natively support local modification timestamps for files.

To work around this issue, CS Browser adds a custom metadata field to each file during upload: x-amz-meta-s3b-last-modified. You can check this header on the HTTP Headers tab.

When you download files, CS Browser reads the original modification time from the x-amz-meta-s3b-last-modified header and applies it to the file upon completion of the download.

Please note, if the files were originally uploaded using third-party software, this custom metadata field may not be added. As a result, CS Browser would be unable to restore the original modification time.

The logs are stored in the following directory: %appdata%\s3browser\logs

You can paste this path into the Windows Explorer address bar or into the Windows Run dialog.

Currently, it is Windows only, sorry. Other platforms are not planned in the near future.

If you enabled versioning for the bucket before deleting the file or folder, they can be restored according to the instructions here: https://s3browser.com/amazon-s3-versioning.aspx#view-and-restore-versions

If versioning was not enabled, there is no way to restore deleted files or folders, sorry.

If you are comfortable with command line tools, you can schedule uploads, downloads, or syncs using Windows Task Scheduler and the following tool: s3browser-cli.exe (you can find it in the folder where you installed CS Browser).

Check out the following tutorial for more details: https://s3browser.com/s3cmd.aspx

The search in bucket is not supported natively by Amazon S3.

As a workaround, you may use Flat Browsing Mode and Display Filters.

Please ensure that the number of uploading threads is increased in Tools, Options, Queueing. Usually, 10-16 uploading threads are enough to utilize all available bandwidth.

Also, make sure there are no other running applications on your machine that may consume bandwidth; this can be checked in Windows Task Manager.

It's possible that your bandwidth is limited by your Internet Service Provider. You can check your actual upload speed here: https://www.speedtest.net

Yes, Snowball devices are supported. Here are the settings you need to configure in CS Browser:

1. In the Account window:

   • Set the Account Type to Amazon S3 compatible Storage
   • Set the API Endpoint to the device address,
     for example 10.0.20.205:8080
   • Enter your Access Key ID and Secret Access Key

2. In the Advanced Amazon S3 compatible Storage Settings window:

   • Set the Signature version to Signature V4
   • Set the Addressing model to Path style
   • Check Override storage regions and set the regions to
     Default Region=snow

   For more details, please refer to the screenshots: Account settings and Advanced Amazon S3 compatible Storage Settings

Check out the following folder: %appdata%\s3browser\

%appdata%\s3browser\ is a hidden folder. You can paste this path into the Windows Explorer address bar or into the Win+R dialog.