Windows 7: Encrypted/Corrupted Zip file

Hey guys,
Not sure if this is the right forum to be posting in, I basically backed up my content from an old laptop and ive kept it ever since, its been put onto an external haddrive for a while and now I need to access it.
So I get it and try to extract is and its asking for a password, well ive entered what im sure the password is but it says it isnt correct; very confusing. So I try some more because this was quite a while ago, but still nothing.
Then I get one of these password recovery programs, when I select the input file it says it isnt a zip file!? (it definitely ends in .zip and definitely is a .zip)



Does anyone have any ideas of what to do? Its quite a long password as it was the entire contents of my laptop so it has some sensitive material on it to do with work and bank account details and such.

Thanks in advance!

Can you see the files and folders on the external drive?
Have you tried to take ownership of them?

You won't be able to extract programs ... you'll have to download them again, unless you still have the installer saved.

Yeah I can see all the files on there, the filenames and their size and stuff but I just cant do anything with them. I made a backup of the files on a Mac and used something called StuffIt because I wanted to password protect it (ive used it on many zips before and always have been able to extract them, it just seems like this is an exception).

What do you mean by take ownership?

Thanks for the reply by the way

Tutorial here Take Ownership Shortcut