I think you're between a rock and a hard place. To use the Sybase supplied DLLs, you would need to use an MS toolchain to compile the DBD::Sybase XS. So that means ActiveState and an install of the correct version of Visual Studio. If you want to use Strawberry Perl, I think your only path would be to 1) install Strawberry Perl; 2) using the toolchain from Strawberry Perl (gcc), install freetds; 2) point your SYBASE ENV to the freetds libs and use those libs instead of the Sybase supplied ones to build DBD::Sybase.