>Doesn't COM+ use something different now? I've read a couple of places about components using the COM+ catalog instead of the registry.

That's just for COM+ registered objects. It's really just the the Metabase. But that's only used for the add-on services like Queued Components, and Events etc. that are using COM+ attributes and settings. All those things you set in the COM+ Application administrator dialogs for each application and each of the components.

But underneath all that calls back into COM.

I'm sure the .Net objects also call back into COM for most of the functionality they provide but the developer doesn't have access to that and the objects natively aren't COM objects.

Which if you ask me is definitely not a bad thing!!! COM has always been too difficult to work with for all the benefits it did provide.