Quote Originally Posted by WILL View Post
Well there should be DB libraries out there that don't need to be hooked into the whole "components" concept.
You can always make yourself "custom database" using Typed Files. http://delphi.about.com/od/fileio/a/fileof_delphi.htm
The article only shows having single record type per file (signle table per file). So if you want to have multiple record types stored in signle file you have to combine that with the use of mapped files. Article about this on my To-Do list. Time of compleetiomn unknown

The main advantage of making your own "custom database" is that your records can contain fields of almost all Pascal based variable types while most existing databases limitsto their internal field types. The only limitation is that the field variable must have fixed size, no standard strings or dynamical arrays.
Main disadvantage is that such database might not be compatible with non pascal based programs and you have to use mapped file approach if you want to have multiple record types in same file.