Windows 2000 Administration in a Nutshell

Name

computer

Synopsis

Configure and create computer accounts, and join a computer to a domain or workgroup.

Procedures

Computer accounts are managed with Active Directory Users and Computers, while computers can be configured to join a workgroup or domain using Computer Management or System in the Control Panel.

Configure a Computer Account

Open the Active Directory Users and Computers console → right-click on a computer account → Properties

This lets you change the group membership, location, and other properties of the account. There is typically not much you need to configure here, if anything, for computer accounts.

Create a Computer Account

When you join a computer to a domain, you are prompted to provide credentials for creating a computer account for the computer. The new account is represented by a Computer object that is located by default within the default Computers container within the domain container in Active Directory. You can create computer accounts directly using Active Directory Users and Computers, however:

Open the Active Directory Users and Computers console → right-click on an OU → New → Computer → specify name of computer → OK

Once a computer account has been created (either manually or when the computer joined the domain), you can configure it (see Section earlier in this article).

Tip

Computer accounts can be used together with Group Policy to manage policy settings on computers. You cannot link a Group Policy Object (GPO) to the default Computers container ...