Screaming in the Cloud
Screaming in the Cloud
Corey Quinn
Solving the 20-Year S3 File System Problem with Hunter Leath
31 minutes Posted Jan 20, 2026 at 11:00 am.
Hunter Leath, CEO of Archil, spent 8 years building Amazon's EFS file storage system, learning exactly why making cloud storage act like a hard drive always fails. Old programs need hard drives, but cloud storage doesn't work like hard drives—a problem that's existed for 20 years.Now Hunter's building Archil, which puts super-fast storage between programs and S3 so they can finally work together. Your programs think they're talking to a regular disk while your data lives safely in the cloud.Hunter explains how they're doing what others couldn't, why it costs less than Amazon's own solutions, and why file systems suddenly matter again in the AI era.Show Highlights:
What Archil Does and Why It Exists
Why Mounting S3 as a File System Has Always Failed
What Building EFS Taught Hunter
Using Fast SSDs as a Cache Layer for S3
Attaching Archil to Your Existing S3 Buckets
Why Archil Costs Less Than EBS When You Do the Math
What Happens If Amazon Builds This Feature
Competing With EBS Performance on GP3 Volumes
Raising $6.7 Million Without an AI Pitch
What Customers Get Wrong About Archil
Accessing Data Stored in Glacier Deep Archive
The Plan to Get Into the Linux Kernel
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Hunter Leath, CEO of Archil, spent 8 years building Amazon's EFS file storage system, learning exactly why making cloud storage act like a hard drive always fails. Old programs need hard drives, but cloud storage doesn't work like hard drives—a problem that's existed for 20 years.Now Hunter's building Archil, which puts super-fast storage between programs and S3 so they can finally work together. Your programs think they're talking to a regular disk while your data lives safely in the cloud.Hunter explains how they're doing what others couldn't, why it costs less than Amazon's own solutions, and why file systems suddenly matter again in the AI era.Show Highlights:(01:37) What Archil Does and Why It Exists(02:26) Why Mounting S3 as a File System Has Always Failed(03:07) What Building EFS Taught Hunter(06:55) Using Fast SSDs as a Cache Layer for S3(09:45) Attaching Archil to Your Existing S3 Buckets(15:08) Why Archil Costs Less Than EBS When You Do the Math(17:56) What Happens If Amazon Builds This Feature(19:20) Competing With EBS Performance on GP3 Volumes(21:43) Raising $6.7 Million Without an AI Pitch(23:46) What Customers Get Wrong About Archil(28:07) Accessing Data Stored in Glacier Deep Archive(29:24) The Plan to Get Into the Linux Kernel (30:51) Where to Find HunterAbout Hunter Leath: Hunter is the founder and CEO of Archil, which transforms S3 buckets into infinite, local file systems that provide instant access to massive data sets. Prior to Archill, Hunter spent the last ten years in the cloud storage industry, including 8 years building Amazon's Elastic File System product and one year on Netflix's core storage team.Links:Hunter Leath on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hleath/Hunter Leath on X: https://x.com/jhleath/Archil’s Website: https://archil.comSponsored by: duckbillhq.com