I think you should try using ubuntu that boots up directly from CD. You might need to check your bootup sequence first, disable boot from hard drive option, then run ubuntu. If it recognize your hard drive as a local drive, they you are almost done. You may be able to access your data files in it.

If the crash is in your hard disk, it may be hard to recover your important data. If it is very important for you, I recommend consulting some professional companies offering data-recovery service than trying yourself. I heard, microsoft also has data recovery service. Although the data recovery services are expensive, they do not guaranty successful recovery. Chance of success is around 60% only. In 2004, I had my hard disk crashed. and I took my hard disk to Sharp company. They could not recover my data, but they were able to repair my hard drive. Spending about $50, they returned me computer with pre-installed softwares and systems, exactly same as in the newly bought version of the computer but with none of my own data I wanted to recover. They told they were unable to read data segments and could not access to old data. Then, when they reset all, the hard disk started to work. The hard disk still works.