> I am not used to using gbak as a wrapper around services API. When I
> remove the host name, it doesn't work on my laptop either:
>
> gbak -b -se localhost:service_mgr myalias c:\test.fbk -user sysdba
> -password masterke -v -g
>
> gbak: ERROR: unavailable database
> gbak: Exiting before completion due to errors

It seems Firebird is not running on localhost. Or some software blocked
it from run (NOD32 for example)

> (I presumed this to be because I am using Classic server, prepending
> localhost works on my laptop, but not on the server).
>
> I now have a remote desktop connection to the server, and it is
> throwing the following error
>
> ---
> C:\Program Files\Firebird\Firebird_1_5\bin>gbak -b -se
> localhost:service_mgr myalias c:\test.fbk -user sysdba -password
> masterke -v -g
> gbak: ERROR: operating system directive CreateProcess failed
> gbak: ERROR: unknown Win32 error 193
> gbak: Exiting before completion due to errors
> ---

MSDN :
ERROR_BAD_EXE_FORMAT (193)
is not a valid Win32 application

In FB 1.5 Services API just run corresponding utilities by the engine
process. It seems your copy of gbak.exe is corrupted (or server tried
to run it from another location where it is not exists).


Regards,
Vlad