If a hard drive is partitioned, the first sector is a Master Boot Record. If it is not partitioned, it is called a Volume Boot Record. MBR's are used for:
Holding a partition table
Booting the operating system
Giving each disk a 32-bit signature
The MBR is not part of any partition.
For more information on MBR's, including how to repair a broken one or creating your own with a disk editing utility, see Wikipedia's article.
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What about virus and MBR?
Can a system boot without a MBR?
I can remember dealing with viruses that corrupted the MBR, and BIOS's having a "virus protection" that would flash the screen and ask for a conformation before modifying the MBR, but it seems like no common viruses today target the MBR. Probably due to increased security.
It is possible to boot without an MBR - EFI uses a GPT or Guid Partition Table, which 64-bit computers often use. A GPT is nice because it's written at the beginning AND end of the drive for redundancy.
So is it possible to partition a drive, put Vista 64-bit on one partition, Vista 32-bit on the other partition, and be able to switch OSs without restarting your computer and switching the Master every time? If you are wondering why I want to do this, it's so I can print with my HP Laserjet 1000. 64-bit drivers do not exist for lots of HP printers, as explained here:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c00439068&lang=en&cc=us
Lesson learned: Don't buy HP products, as they will not be supported for long.
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