Delphi XE2 64 bit client connection to Firebird 2.5

Question

I have a DelphiXE2 client running against a Firebird 2.5 32bit session.

My development environment is Windows 7 64bit, and I use the InterBase client components.

Everything works fine as long as I compile the project 32bit.

The project compiles fine to 64bit - very pleased :-) - but then I get a "connection rejected by remote interface" error on login - not pleased :-(

I have ensured to remove all gds32.dll and I have installed Firebird 2.5 client 32bit fbclient.dll. The fbclient.dll is copied to the SysWOW64 directory.

What can be causing this reject?

Answer 1

A requirement of the system is:

All the libraries loaded by a executable must be of the same bitness , this means you must load 64 bit dll's on a 64 bit process and 32 bit dll's on a 32 bit process.

Take a look at the No Mixed 64-Bit/32-Bit Processes entry in List of limitations in 64-Bit Windows

This applies to the Firebird client also. In order to successfully connect to your Firebird database from a 64 bit process you must install the 64 bit client of Firebird .

A machine may have both 32 bit and 64 bit clients installed, since they reside in different folders, the dll's can and usually have the same name.

This doesn't affect the ability to connect to 32 or 64 bit servers. In other words, this is not about the Firebird Server, all is about the Firebird Client.