This is why you typically leave the hard drive (or in this case, the laptop) in the freezer for atleast a few hours. Doing this allowed me to copy a 60 gig which windows couldn't even mount to work no problem - which took well over a couple hours, all in one shot. Using this method, the electronics don't need to be kept in your refrigerator or freezer.
Sounds like you had removed the hard drive, which does provide an added cooling advantage this guy felt unable to exploit.