My Hard Drive is Dead

A software solution is not the answer you need a Hardware Solution and the best I've ever dealt with was Kroll On Track who if necessary can read data directly off the platters of the HDD.

Though this is not a cheap option and can cost a lot of money but provided that the Platters have no Physical Damage all the data is recoverable.

The question now is do you want to pay to have it recovered?

A few years ago they ran an advertising campaign telling people how they recovered Data off a Drive that was on Colombia when it was destroyed and the life of the drive after the failure of Colombia. How it flew into a swamp at high speed sat covered in water and god only knows what for 6 months before it was discovered and then at some point in time latter they where given the drive to work their magic on.

I've given them a drive that was dropped 3 stories or so and had everything recovered within a little over 30 hours. The company who owned the drive was only 1 hour late for a Tax Audit and yes the cost of the recovery was a Tax Deduction and even with the large amount paid for the recovery it still saved them a lot of money.