This could simply be because I'm terrible at finishing anything I start, but I would take it as an opportunity to start over and try to make it even better than it was the first time around. It's a lot of work, yes, but you'll be surprised how much quicker you'll work now that you 100% know what you're doing.

Also, don't take my advice.

Hmm... It's entirely possible the files are still accessible in some way, I would get to googling, if I were you. My external hard drive, for example, died because of problems completely unrelated to the actual memory and though I have no need of the files on it, they're still there, waiting for me to fix it. I read something about some kind of cable.... A SATA data cable? I can't remember... I think those can connect directly to an external drive... Maybe look into that, see if it can help.

There are quite a few repair companies around that can retrieve data from a malfunctioning hard drive.

You should shop around for one. I would reccomend MicroCenter, but I'm not sure if that's outside Chicago. They charge a lot, anyway.