How do I recover files from my Hard Disk which is affected by a virus?

I'm on Windows XP. The OS will not boot because of a virus. How do I recover the files from my hard drive.
I do have a laptop and another PC that I could use to aid the process. Just don't know exactly what to do to hook up the affected Hard drive to the good computer and recover important files.

Is there a way that I could hook up the bad PC to a good laptop, and use the laptop's OS to access files on the virus infected Hard drive?

get an IDE to USB adapter off of ebay ($10) and then you can hook the bad hard drive to the laptop and recover. Of course make sure the laptop is up to date on anti-virus, so you don't spread the virus over.

Or get a live cd (like Ubuntu or miniPE) and boot the PC to the cd. Then you'll be running from the CD's OS and you can pull the files need off.

The easiest way is to remove the hard drive from the infected computer and install it in another computer which if you have anti-virus should not be affected at all. Then you should scan the entire hard drive to ensure you are not transferring and infected files. After this just copy your files from one hard drive to the other and you should be good. Also, if you do not know how to install the infected hard drive you can buy an enclosure at almost any computer retailer which you put the hard drive in.

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You will need a "live OS" like Knoppix (which you can google a download for). Use Paragon Hard Drive Manager if it is included on the version you downloaded (on the quick launch bar or most distributions) or one of the many other hard drive management programs available on the operation system.

If it's affected only by a virus,try setting the hdd as a slave and connecting it to another pc,and do a virus scan and try to restore it

Try load the xp installation disk and select the option repair if successful, burn your files to cd-r or dvd. Do not format the harddrive. When you are done back-up the files, re-install winxp and create a drive d partition for future where you save your files and you can format c in the future without touching d partition.