I hadn't read all of the first paragraph (doh)

You'd easilly be able to mount the drives to get the data off

You need to get this CD, User Posted Link

When you boot the pc, you press the F key which changes the boot order (different on machines, it tells you as the machine turns on, usually F12, but could be F2 or F8). You ask your machine to boot from the cd instead of the hard drive

From there you run parted magic (which runs an operating system through the ram and not the hard drive). It won't change anything on your computer, it's just a temporary operating system

When that loads up, there's an icon on the desktop which says "mount drives", and then you ask it to mount your hdd

If there's still life in the hard drive, you can mount your usb flash key you've bought, and copy over the data

Posted By: pants, May 1, 12:13:02