>The problem is that you need to add data components visually, which has the downside of combining services from multiple tiers.

No you don't. There's no requirement for any of the SQLClient objects be hosted by the form or web page. You only require the DataSet for binding.

Also, Microsoft released a wrapper for data access back in April.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnbda/html/daab-rm.asp

How does it compare to what you've written up?

-Mike