Most of my equipment has toasted, and I need the data back.

Question

I must have been a very, very bad person in a past life. This week has been more technologically harrowing than I'd thought possible.
My cherished Titanium Powerbook died after a valiant battle, and the Apple techs said that there was nothing they could do, Apple just doesn't support such antiques (not sure if they meant me or the PB). They did let me download my files onto my 80G Smartdisk FireLite, and though the PB hard drive was acting a bit wonky and transfer was slow, I got most of the files. Most everything already had been backed up on the FireLite, but I grabbed the remainder. This means that My Entire Life resided on the FireLite.
I was about to download the files onto the G4 cube, and plugged in a USB hub with an optical mouse and a jump drive on it--and something started to burn. The jump drive, the mouse, and the hub fried. Now it looks as though the well-named FireLite is toast too, since though it powers up, it won't mount and nothing recognizes it. The cube is fine.
I still have the hard drive from the late lamented Powerbook, so if it holds up a bit longer, I ought to be able to save most if not all the files. Can I do this myself if I can get an external case to power the PB drive? And if the PB drive does indeed hold up, could I continue to use it? (This would be helpful, since the MacBook Pro won't run Classic, which is necessary in the short term for all my current programs and most peripherals.)
If an external case is feasible, can someone give me specs for what to get? I'm hoping it's affordable, though I'd also look for one to borrow.
If it isn't feasible, would someone please shoot me now?
Thanks.

Answer 1

Hi A,
Just one thought to add: I would get a FireWire enclosure so if you ever want to clone an entire HD on a Mac, you would then have a secure backup which was also able to boot said Mac.