Mastering Active Directory - Second Edition

Containers versus OUs

When you open the Active Directory Users and Computers (ADUC) Microsoft Management Console (MMC) with the advanced view, there will be pre-setup folders. But not all of these are OUs. They are mostly containers:

The only default OU in the AD environment is the Domain Controllers OU. All other folders in the tree are containers. Containers can also contain objects. The Computers and Users containers are good examples of that. By default, any computer object will be stored in the Computers container. All of the default user accounts and security groups are stored in the Users container. Similar to OUs, containers can also ...