I've known Data Rescue for years, and it saved my life twice...

The first time was 4 years ago, when my internal HD died. I spent months trying to extract stuff from it, with no luck obviously. Then I tried Data Rescue.. and it managed to extract almost all of my files!

And again, last January my portable firewire HD died. Actually, I couldn't extract anything from it because it was super-dead, but I had a recent backup.. from which I'd accidentally deleted many important folders! I used Data Rescue to recover the deleted files, and it found *everything*!!!
Only [very] small complaint is that the files weren't in their original directories and didn't have their names, but at least I had them! And anyway, it apparently recovers the files in the "order" it finds them, so actually they were in their original directory order... A bit more complicate with images, since they're sorted by size, but oh well.

I totally suggest this application, it's a real lifesaver!!! :D