HOWTO: Mount and explore TrueCrypt volumes in one step

This article will show you how to use the power of a Windows batch script to mount a TrueCrypt volume and explore the contents as a hard drive in just one step. For those of you that don’t know, TrueCrypt is free software that you can use to encrypt files. You can create a container file (named anything you want) and mount it as a drive using the TrueCrypt software. Unmounted, it looks just like a regular file.

Create your volume

Create any size TrueCrypt volume using your encryption algorithm of choice. My computer runs the Blowfish algorithm the fastest, so that’s my typical choice. Make sure you assign a good, long, hard-to-break password to it. The only way to reveal the contents of the volume is the password. We’re talking encryption standards the government uses here. So no one’s going to break in another way — you need a good password and you must remember it.

Copy TrueCrypt stand-alone files

TrueCrypt comes in an installable version and an stand-alone version. You can use the stand-alone command-only version for the batch script. The stand-alone files are inside the “Setup Files” folder inside the TrueCrypt folder. Go ahead and copy truecrypt.sys and truecrypt-x64.sys to C:\WINDOWS\. This will allow us to call the TrueCrypt program in the batch script.

Create a script to mount

You may download a batch script I wrote to mount a volume. Make sure you fill in the appropriate parts specific to you. These parts are capitalized to stand out. Place this script in C:\WINDOWS\ so you can call it from the Run box. Here’s the main line in the script:

tc /v <path to file> /l x /p <your password> /q

Make sure you fill in the correct path to your file, and the appripriate password you’ve chosen. You may notice, I use various flags in the call. The /v flag will make TC mount a volume; then /l x will mount it as the letter X:\ (like it’s a drive); /p means the password follows it. Finally, /q will quit the program. After the mounting takes place, we call explorer on the X:\ drive to open it.

Create a script to unmount

Following the previous script’s example, I’ve also written a script to unmount your volume. Fill in the necessary changes. Place this script in C:\WINDOWS\ so you can call it from the Run box. The only new flag I use is /dx which will dismount the X:\ drive.

Test it out

Time to test it all out. Hit WinKey + R > type in mount and hit Enter. Your volume should mount and should open in Windows Explorer. Now, to unmount it, in the Run box, type in unmount and hit Enter. Nextel. Done.

Also, you can rename the batch scripts to something only you will know, so it’s not easy to mount on your computer. For example, change mount.bat and unmount.bat to something like xy33.bat and sysz.bat. Only you will know.