NT Gatekeeper: Usrmgr.exe vs. Musrmgr.exe

I discovered two User Manager tools—usrmgr.exe and musrmgr.exe—on one of our administrator workstations. At first look, these tools seem to have the same functionality. How do they differ?

User Manager (musrmgr.exe) is a Windows NT Workstation 4.0 tool for managing a workstation's accounts (also known as local accounts). User Manager for Domains (usrmgr.exe) is an NT Server 4.0 tool for administering an NT domain's accounts (also known as domain accounts).

Musrmgr is a reduced functionality version of Usrmgr. When you work with a workstation, many of the options for NT domains don't apply, so you don't need the extra features that Usrmgr provides. Unlike Musrmgr, Usrmgr can be used to administer domain accounts, global groups, and trust relationships.

Usrmgr is the only tool a domain administrator really needs. You can use Usrmgr to manage not only domain accounts but also local accounts stored in the SAM of workstations and member servers. To connect to another SAM, simply choose Select Domain from the User menu. In the resulting dialog box, you can select a domain or type the name of a workstation or member server whose SAM you want to connect to. If you type the machine name, make sure that you precede it with two backslashes.

If your primary computer is an NT workstation and you'll regularly administer domain accounts from this machine, you can install Usrmgr on it. To do so, go to the ClientsSrvtoolsWinnt directory on the NT Server 4.0 CD-ROM on your workstation and execute the setup.bat file.