Pendush — USB Utility

A simple, fast, and rock-solid native Windows USB utility.

Developed by PinkDotHash, a software tools brand by Akruno.

📥 Download Latest Installer (v1.0.1) • 🛡️ Safety Specs • 🔒 Privacy Policy • 💬 Report an Issue

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💡 Guiding Philosophy

"Build small. Solve real problems. Make excellent tools."

Pendush is engineered in pure C++20 and Win32 for maximum reliability, speed, and safety. Unlike heavy Electron-based or bloated disk tools, Pendush has zero third-party UI dependencies, starts instantly, and performs real hardware-level diagnostics and formatting with total precision.

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✨ Features at a Glance

Feature	Description
🚀 Bootable USB Creator	Native ISO9660 & UDF analysis. Seamlessly create bootable Windows & Linux USB drives with automated Windows 11 TPM/SecureBoot/RAM bypass, automatic $>4\text{ GB}$ WIM splitting for FAT32, and byte-exact raw DD streaming.
🛡️ Zero-Tolerance Safety	Dynamic OS disk detection unconditionally protects internal Windows drives, recovery partitions, and pagefiles from accidental erasure with fail-closed TargetSession live locking.
🔍 Hardware Diagnostics	Real GPT Header CRC32 validation, protective MBR verification, filesystem dirty bit detection, and S.M.A.R.T. predictive failure alerts.
🛠️ Storage Repair & Formatting	Quick fixes for RAW drives, missing drive letters, software write-protection attributes, and low-level FAT32, NTFS, and exFAT formatting.
🧪 Speed Benchmark & NAND Probe	Deterministic pseudo-random vector benchmark with unbuffered direct I/O + multi-strided memory wrap-around fake capacity detection to expose fraudulent flash drives.
🧼 USB Security & Vaccine	Heuristic scanner for disguised .exe malware and shortcut worms, plus built-in write-locked autorun immunization (\autorun.inf\lpt1.pendush_lock).
🎨 Warm Paper Design System	Clean, distraction-free warm light aesthetic (#F4F1EA) with pixel-perfect High-DPI scaling on Windows 10 and 11.
🔄 1-Click Auto-Updates	Built-in lightweight WinHTTP update checker that alerts you when a new release is published on GitHub.

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📥 Installation & Setup

System Requirements:

• Operating System: Windows 10 / Windows 11 (64-bit x64)
• Privileges: Administrator Rights (required for physical disk IOCTL operations)
• RAM / Storage: < 20 MB RAM, < 10 MB disk space

Quick Install:

1. Download the latest installer: Pendush_Setup_x64.exe.
2. Run the installer and follow the setup wizard.
3. Launch Pendush from your Desktop or Start Menu.

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📖 Complete User Guide

1. Creating a Bootable USB Drive

1. Insert your USB flash drive (minimum 8 GB recommended for modern OS images).
2. Open Pendush and select your USB drive from the top Target Device dropdown.
3. Click the Create USB tab on the left sidebar.
4. Click Browse... to select your image file (.iso, .img, or .raw).
   • Pendush automatically inspects the image structure, determines whether it is Windows or Linux, and configures the optimal partition scheme (GPT for UEFI or MBR for Legacy BIOS).
   • If Windows 11 is detected, you can check "Bypass Windows 11 Hardware Checks" to automatically skip TPM 2.0, Secure Boot, and RAM limits.
5. Click Create Bootable USB and confirm the safety prompt.

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2. Testing for Fake / Fraudulent USB Drives (Authenticity Probe)

Counterfeit flash drives spoof their internal controller firmware to report a fake capacity (e.g. reporting 128 GB when only 16 GB of physical NAND exists), causing silent file corruption.

1. Select your USB drive in Pendush.
2. Navigate to Speed & Capacity Test in the sidebar.
3. Click Run Fake Capacity Probe.
4. Pendush tests physical memory address boundaries using deterministic test vectors. If address wrap-around is detected, Pendush will alert you with the real physical memory limit.

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3. Repairing Write-Protected, RAW, or Corrupted USB Drives

If Windows says your drive is "Write Protected", "RAW", or refuses to format:

1. Go to the Tools & Repair tab.
2. Try individual quick repairs:
   • Clear Read-Only Attribute: Clears software write-protection flags via disk attributes.
   • Mount / Repair Drive Letter: Mounts missing volume letters so Explorer can see your drive.
   • Filesystem Check (chkdsk): Performs a non-destructive filesystem scan and repairs cluster chains.
3. For severely corrupted or stubborn drives, click Full USB Reinitialization:
   • Pendush cleans the partition headers, re-writes a fresh MBR/GPT partition layout with 1MB alignment, and creates a clean FAT32 filesystem.

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4. USB Security & Immunization Vaccine

1. Go to the Tools & Repair tab $\to$ Security & Protection.
2. Click Scan USB Drive to detect hidden shortcut worms (.lnk), double-extension executables (e.g. document.pdf.exe), or malicious autorun.inf files.
3. Click Apply USB Vaccine:
   • Creates an undeletable, read-only directory lock on your USB drive (\autorun.inf\lpt1.pendush_lock), preventing malware from creating autorun scripts when plugged into public or shared computers.

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🛡️ Safety-First Architecture

Pendush is built with strict multi-layer safeguards to prevent accidental data loss:

1. Dynamic Windows System Detection: Queries kernel storage drivers (IOCTL_STORAGE_GET_DEVICE_NUMBER, IOCTL_VOLUME_GET_VOLUME_DISK_EXTENTS, GetSystemWindowsDirectoryW) to identify active OS drives, system partitions, crash dumps, and page files.
2. Fixed Internal Disk Protection: Non-removable internal NVMe/SATA SSDs are blocked from destructive format commands.
3. Fail-Closed DeviceIdentity & TargetSession: Validates serial numbers, PNP IDs, disk indices, and capacity before executing raw block writes.
4. Clean Volume Locking: Unmounts and locks volume handles exclusively during operations to prevent file conflicts.

For complete technical details, see the Safety Architecture Specification.

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🔄 Automatic Updates & Privacy

• Zero Telemetry: Pendush contains no analytics trackers, crash beacons, or data collection. See Privacy Policy.
• Update Checks: When enabled in Logs & Settings, Pendush queries the public GitHub Releases REST API (https://api.github.com/repos/mujahidalmahi/pendush/releases/latest) over HTTPS.
• Updates are non-intrusive and never install anything without your explicit consent.

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📄 License & Credits

• Product: Pendush
• Version: 1.0.1
• Developer: Mujahid Al Mahi
• Brand: PinkDotHash
• Parent Company: Akruno
• License: Apache License 2.0
• Official Repository: https://github.com/mujahidalmahi/pendush