Problem with boot drive, please help

[Muse]

Edit: Thinkpad Forums are still down, they're moving their data to a dedicated server. I have no idea when they'll be back up, so I don't know what the reply was to my post there. I'm waiting for someone to reply here before I do anything with that machine. I suppose I could remove the internal HD, put it in an enclosure and plug that into one of my other machines and run Western Digital Diagnostics on it, maybe even run something to repair its MBR. I'd prefer to hear some feedback on this, I'm a little in the dark here. Following is the text of the post I made here this morning:
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This happened yesterday. It's with my Lenovo Thinkpad T60, which I use as a server, the data residing on an external USB 2TB Western Digital HD attached to the laptop, which runs Windows XP. I composed a post asking for help at Thinkpad Forums, but they have apparently been having problems. Fortunately when I composed the post in their editor I copied and pasted the content into an email to myself before hitting the [Submit new thread] button, because the forum had evidently gone down while I was composing the post. Thus, I didn't lose my post, which took some time and effort to create! I got email notification today that I've gotten responses to the post, which I succeeded in posting there later yesterday. But this morning, trying to access the answer(s) I repeatedly can't hit their site. So, I figure I'll post here instead. I think the level of expertise is better here, anyway. Here's the post:

Can't hit this right now, eventually, yes, I suppose: forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=29&t=112787&p=724268&e=724268

Subject: Problem backing up T60 with XP, please help

Today I got the idea to back up one of my laptops, a T60 running XP. It
serves as my data server, on 24/7. I have a 2TB external USB HD attached
to it where I keep my data. The laptop has a 340GB HD, just one
partition (around 30GB used). I decided it was time to Ghost the OS in
case something goes wrong, so I wouldn't have to basically start over
installing the OS, Windows Updates, installing stuff, yada yada.

So, I put in my Ghost CD (Norton Ghost 2003), and boot from that. To
pick a drive or partition to make an image from, I saw the main drive
and the USB drive. But when picking a place to write the image files I
didn't see the external USB drive. Guess I can't write to the main
HD if it isn't partitioned. So, I reasoned that I would have to
partition the main HD to have a separate data partition. So, I install
Partition Magic 7.0, which I've done quite a few times on my computers
and instruct it to create the 2nd partition. It was to be 210 GB,
leaving around 90GB, something like that for the boot partition. I
indicated that I didn't want to be able to boot from the new partition.
Partition Magic also saw the "Service..." partition, which is, I
suppose, the partition where recover files are located. It recommended
having my new partition AFTER the Service partition, and I accepted that
setting, clicked "Apply Changes" and let Partition Magic reboot the
machine and run its batch file that accomplishes its mission. I went to
do some errands, came back to the machine and saw an error on the
monitor that occurred some time after the batch file began running. The
message said:
- - - -
Exception C0000005 has occurred at address 011119CD (000809CD) in
xmnt2001.exe.

StackAddr:
0012F340: 00000000 00000000 01159114 00DC1CDB
etc.
etc.
etc.
etc.
etc.
etc.
etc.
etc.

Insert a floppy then contact PowerQuest technical support at:
contact info

Error C0000034 openning the floppy device
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Now, the error opening the floppy device I think had to do with its
attempt to write an error file.

Anyway, now every time I try to reboot I get this blue screen message:
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A problem has been detected and windows has been shut down to prevent
damage to your computer.

If this is the first time you've seen this stop error screen, restart
your computer. If this screen appears again, follow these steps:

Disable or uninstall any anti-virus, disk defragmentation or backup
utilities. Check your hard drive configuration, and check for any
updated drivers. Run CHKDSK /F to check for hard drive corruption, and
then restart your computer.

Technical information:

*** STOP: 0x00000024 (0x00190203,0x8A000cA0,0xC0000102,0x00000000)
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So, I insert a Windows XP install disk and get to a prompt. Tried
running fixmbr, to no apparent avail. I don't think the parameters were
correct. Anyway, the thing appears to be that the prompt is at the C:
drive, but a dir command reveals that it's the external USB drive that's
coming up as the C: drive. The machine isn't recognizing the internal
HD.

What should I do here? I have an external 2.5" USB HD enclosure, I could
put the 340GB drive in there and attach it to one of my other machines.
I also have a caddy I could use with one of my other laptops (T60 and
T61). Assuming the HD is OK, I could partition it and format the
partitions that way and install XP anew. I have T60 XP recovery disks.
Can I install XP that way to one of two partitions on the disk?

Thanks for any help.

 

[Dr-Kiev]

What should I do here? I have an external 2.5" USB HD enclosure, I could
put the 340GB drive in there and attach it to one of my other machines.
I also have a caddy I could use with one of my other laptops (T60 and
T61). Assuming the HD is OK, I could partition it and format the
partitions that way and install XP anew. I have T60 XP recovery disks.
Can I install XP that way to one of two partitions on the disk?

Thanks for any help.

If you made second and 3d partitions as secondary ones ( one MBR-MasterBootRecord for all), you can allocate only one boot partition.
But if you could create several primary partitions (each has its own MBR) , you can allocate several boot partitions, and install several different windows.