Most average computer users don't. At this stage we don't know what the OP is capable of. Perhaps we should make suggestions that the layman can understand and take it from there.
Problem is, safe mode, given the information we have (strange noise), is more likely to put the OP into a critical zone and risk their data.
If you want to keep your data safe and sound, you're going to turn it off, stick your HDD into a USB adapter and copy the files you need to another PC.
If you can't do this yourself, find someone to help you.
I'm being melodramatic, but you'll wish you'd done this if you lose your data!
Safe Mode has never resulted in me losing data and I must have encountered safe mode at least 50 times.
Transplanting to another system is likely to be fraught with further problems if the OP had set their data to be private and/or encrypted. This will need the original username and password.
What I was suggesting was, using safe mode/doing anything puts more stress on the machine.
Assuming the worst, that the hdd is failing, any stress at all is undesirable.
Boot it up with a liveCD, check dmesg, run hdparm, dd a couple times on the drive to ensure drive status, even check drive smart readings if needed. Then run memtest on memory to see if get any errors. Last check /proc/acpi for power readings and also check temp etc... If all looks fine then just back you data up and reinstall the machine.
The advice here is similar to that given by spooky in this thread.
http://www.geoexpat.com/forum/thread69407-2.html
What happens in laymen's terms is that you download some software, burn it onto a CD.
Start up the afflicted computer in another operating system using the CD (in my case it was damn small linux given the computer's age).
Copy files from bad hard drive to an external one after you "mount" the drives.
Relax, part of the panic is over.
No luck! I've tried several times even in safe mode and I get the same blue screen but now with the words..."windows has shut down due to....unmountable_boot_volume". Does that mean my hard drive is gone? Haven't tried the live CD thing yet. Is it still worth trying now?
Should I get a new drive? Any idea how much this would cost roughly? The laptop that has just died on me is about 7 years old.
As you can probably gather, I'm computer-illiterate so everything is double-dutch to me, clear as mud, etc. but thanks all for your suggestions.
The live CD works by using the CD rom instead of the hard drive. Given the laptop's age, I would send it to the big server in the sky.
Buy a new one. 3-4000 HKD for a decent one.
Toss in a $100 USB adapter and you'll be able to read the contents of your old drive too (assuming it isn't dead)