Any way to migrate files+settings from unrecoverable XP install?

Ok, looks like my worst luck did strike and I was unable to recover windowsxp after trying to merge two partitions on that hard drive with Partition Magic 8 Pro. It keeps saying "NTLDR is missing" on startup, I tried a few fixes; running recovery console off the winxp cd and copying over the ntldr files from the 386 folder on the CD, and rebuilding the boot.ini with bootcfg. Nothing works, still keeps saying "NTLDR is missing" and won't boot.. I'd be able to fix this if system restore was actually useful in that instance. Repair Install was not given as an option which is why I had to use recovery console.

Then I took a new hard drive that was sitting around and wiped it with eraser (had a bunch of bad viruses from the previous owner, unremovable by format/anti-virus), reformatted into ntfs and reinstalled windowsxp. Then installed all service packs and now in the process of installing my other software. Is there any way to migrate my files and settings from that old installation? Can't use Windows Files and Settings transfer wizard since it asks me to boot into the old installation and copy the files there... which seems pointless to me when it's right here in my PC on the other hard drive. Sigh @ Microsoft. Any utilities that can do this?

install windows xp over the old copy? it will be garbage install but might let you getin to copy files fast.

Just plug in the other drive and manually copy over whatever files you need. The drive should show up like D: or something, then just drill down into it and copy over whatever you need.

I've been copying over files.. just need to find where the Firefox bookmarks and Outlook Express settings were stored. I forgot.

firefox:
%APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\xxxxxxxx.default\

Where are my Outlook Express Files Stored?
Make sure show hidden files is enabled under Windows Explorer under Tools->Folder Options->Views->Show Hidden Files and Folders

The DBX files that Outlook Express uses are located in:

c:\ (or whatever drive windows resides on)
Documents and Settings
Username (your username)
Application Data
Identities
GUID Identifier (random string like {3B0FA092-2222-1111-A1B2-111A1AA1AAA11}
Microsoft
Outlook Express

outlook express files worked except need to set up my accounts again. Firefox didn't work... I copied those files from the old profile on the old HD to the new one... restarted firefox a few times, no change at all.

Copy over your whole profile folder to the same location on the new installation. Create a user account with the same username, and give that user security access (modify) to the whole folder you just copied. Do not login yet with that account.

Open regedit on the working machine, click on HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, then go to File -> Load Hive. Go to the Windows directory on the non-working XP, to System32/config/software and when that is loaded, go to Software/Microsoft/WindowsNT/CurrentVersion/ProfileList, and export the key that has the userinformation for that profile you just copied previously.
Exit Regedit.
Run that reg on the working XP installation.
Now, log out and log in with that new user account you just created.

Thanks, got my bookmarks working by copying the bookmarks.html over again (for some reason it didn't work the first time when I copied the full contents of the profile folder over) then going to Organize Bookmarks and Import HTML.