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Limitations of  NT Security:

    * Restricted SAM size
    * Single point of failure at the primary domain controller
    * Poor operational performance
    * Poor replication performance
    * Lack of management granularity
    * Nontransitive trust relationships

Security Account Manger (SAM) Database Size:

                               Security accounts in classic NT are stored in the Security Account Manager database, called the SAM for short.The SAM is a flat-file database consisting of a set of Groups and a set of Users. Computer accounts are also included in the SAM as a special form of user account. The total number of users, computers, and groups in classic NT is limited because the SAM cannot grow above a certain size.

                 The PDC is the only server that has read/write access to the SAM in a classic NTdomain. If the PDC crashes or the telecommunications link to it goes down, you cannot make any changes to the domain. You cannot add new users to a group or join computers to the domain. Users can still log on via a backup domain controller (BDC) but they cannot change their passwords. To correct this problem, an administrator must promote a BDC to PDC .

Lack of Management:

A major weakness in the  SAM structure is its inability to support hierarchical

management.

Nontransitive Trust Relationships:

Of all the limitations in classic NT, the ugliest is the inability to link domains together seamlessly while maintaining separate administrative roles.

Classic domains are linked by trust relationships.