Thanks again Antonio.

I notice there's no download for MSXML3 (probably why I skipped over it in my searching), just MSXML6, but I guess I should be using MSXML6 anyway if that works. I've swapped the code ref and I get the exact same error using CREATEOBJECT("MSXML2.ServerXMLHTTP.6.0") anyway. I'm presuming this explicit version reference works - it doesn't throw an error running from my desktop...

It seems odd to me that both DLLs would be corrupted (MSXML3.DLL and MSXML6.DLL), but I don't have anything else to try, so I'll download and reinstall at a quiet time. I tried running the same exe from another Win 2008 R2 server and it ran fine so I guess that supports your theory...

Regards

Graham