Optimizing block and file storage

File storage is similar to the way that a user would organize files on their personal computer. With file storage, you organize and represent data as a hierarchy of files in folders. Separately, block storage groups data into organized but evenly sized volumes. You can think of this in the same way as copy-pasting a bunch of files, images, videos, and other media files into an external hard drive. That hard drive functions as a block store. We’ll explore how to optimize block and file storage next.

Optimizing EBS

For many EC2 instances that you spin up, you can associate a block storage volume to that instance. You can imagine these storage volumes as attached hard drives on your local computer; you can purchase a 1 TB hard drive, attach it to your computer, and expand your storage space. Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS) volumes are similar in this regard but have additional bonuses, such as the ability to elastically change the volume...