Ok i have 2 ways, first one is safe, and probably wouldnt work , second one is dangerous, and u have a chance to recover ure files only if you have completly lost hope cause this method might kill your harddisk for sure. Anyways frist way is enter windows vista CD, boot it and press repair windows, and then click on "Load Drivers" instead of loading any drivers in the new window that opens, go to your files, copy paste them to an exernal hard drive or something, now i think u said ure disk was corrupt and recovery disks didnt work, this might work, i wish you good luck !
Second one is put the hardrive in a plastic bag, the ones that they come with when you purchase one, so anyways put the bag and hardrive inside your freezer for about 30min , take it out , make sure its not melting water and plug it in your PC, the hard disk should work for about 1 hour before it dies again, but it does recover ure files Its been a long time since i did this method, but you can always google it, maybe some updates methods have been discovered, reply back to me hopfully you would have recovered ure files by then Good luck

I'm pretty desperate right now cause I have important files I need soon, so I'm pretty much willing to try anything. So what's the noobish way?