[Macpartners] networking a macbook air with a bad system?

[Aran M. Parillo]

Hi,

The short version of this question is - I've got a MacBook Air with a
bad system and data on the disk I'd like to access, how can I obtain
network access to the disk to recover data?

The longer version of my question goes like this -- A MacBook Air
arrived to my desk today as result of the user interrupting a system
software update (10.5.6) which resulted in kernel panic upon startup.

 From install boot discs I tried a couple of things (permissions/repair)
with no results.  With the user by my side, I popped in a snow leopard
installer to see if perhaps we could option for archive/install and side
step the 10.5.6 issue.  The installer did not allow for option(s) for
the various forms of installation, so I advised the owner to NOT proceed
as I could not ensure that the installer would not overwrite his data in
the process of "updating".  In his haste he asked me to attempt the
update regardless.  *wince*

The update seemed to proceed without issue but upon completion the
machine does not boot.  At present it hangs at the grey apple/pinwheel,
even when assuring 10.6 is set as the boot disk.

I can still boot to an installer and from disk utility and terminal can
see that there apparently is ~120GB of data on the SSD but at this point
I'd really like to attempt some kind of recovery before nuking and clean
installing.

I can also pick off a network signal and from network utility (and
terminal) can confirm I have an IP, I just can't see the Air from my
machine.  I suppose I could command line ftp from this point... I've got 
no experience with mount_afp... or, the little experience I have returns 
a -1069 error.

So... could you share with me any creative options towards getting this
MacBookAir connected to another machine so I can back it up?

TIA!
Aran