Symptoms
If you try to gain access to an Access 2000 or Access 2002 database, you may receive one of the following errors within your Visual Basic program.
If you are using Microsoft ActiveX Data Objects (ADO) (or the ADO Data Control), you receive the following error message:

Run-time error -2147467259 Unrecognized Database Format XXXIf you are using Data Access Objects (DAO) (or the DAO generic Data Control), you receive the following error message:

Run-time error 3343 Unrecognized Database Format XXX
Resolution
Access 2000 and Access 2002 use the Jet 4.0 engine, which creates Jet 4.0 format database files. Jet 3.5 components do not recognize such a format.If you are using ADO, you get error -2147467259 when you try to connect to your Access 2000 or 2002 database through the Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.3.51 provider.If you are using DAO, you get error 3343 when you use the Microsoft DAO 3.51 Object Library.The DAO generic Data Control does not work against Access 2000 or 2002 databases and always generates error 3343 unless it is used as instructed in the “Resolution” section of this article. This occurs because this control is based on Jet 3.51 and only recognizes Jet 3.51 (or before) database formats.