R2FD

R2FD (aka Recover to fix drive) is a lightweight piece of software designed to recover missing files from USB flash drives that were lost due to malware infections via the autorun file, or other reasons.

It doesn't require installation so you can download the package and simply double-click the .exe to bring up the main app window. Only two options are available: erasing all root executables and recovering files, or skipping the first step to just retrieve the missing items.

As far as the interface goes, R2FD has a clean window with a simple look, where the buttons are displayed on the upper-right corner. The first button tells the tool to erase all executable files from all USB flash drives plugged into the computer, then recover the missing items.

This measure can be used when suspecting the USB device to be infected with autorun.inf. By deleting this file, you prevent the autoplay menu from being brought up to the screen, which launches the malware. However, this also means that executables from any other programs you might have on the USB drive will be eliminated by R2FD.

If you fear that this might happen, then you can opt for the second setting, which only scans removable drives for missing files and restores them to a newly created folder called "USBFILES", which is placed on the desktop.

System Volume Information files were successfully recovered in our testing while the program remained light on system resources consumption. However, you should know that it cannot get rid of the autorun file or protect your USB flash drives from malware, which means that you have to equip your computer with a feature-rich antivirus application.