Friends

Both mine and my mom's laptops need to have their harddrive's replaced (geez, really, what kind of freak coincidence is that?).  Fortunately my mom's can still load Windows (though it may randomly shut off/slap me in the face with the BSOD), so we still have internet access and a somewhat working computer in the house.  Unfortunately, my laptop won't boot at all.  At all.  *cries*  And I haven't been backing up my files...!

I haven't really talked to a technician about this (because the warranty ran out on my computer) but I ran a BIOS hard disk self test and after maybe ten seconds it came up with "Test Status: #10009 -- Replace Hard Disk."  That sounds hella bad.

Is there ANY way I can recover my files?  Please, flist, you're my last hope! (That and Facebook, which I have little confidence in--so far I've been told to kick my computer)  An HP technician would just tell me to order a new harddrive (which'll cost hundreds of dollars anyway) and won't help me get my files, if it's even possible. 

Something similar happened once and my dad's co-worker who's a technician retrieved my files for me, but it cost a lot of money. ><  I'm not sure it'll be worth it, but it's my computer so I might be willing to pay for whatever needs to be done anyhow.  Advice??

Finally went and read it. It's the bomb. The BOMB. It's what's on and poppin. *insert other 90's slang phrases*

Unfortunately now I have to go read other stuff by Pratchett and Gaiman, which is bad news bears for my wallet. :(