...that might hopefully help. (It may be best to download the text files from Borland and read them in a text editor; IE doesn't seem to want to do word-wrap on them.)
[link|http://codecentral.borland.com/codecentral/ccweb.exe/listing?id=12549|BDE Frequently Asked Questions]
[link|http://codecentral.borland.com/codecentral/ccweb.exe/listing?id=12668|BDE and Database Desktop Locking Protocol]
[link|http://codecentral.borland.com/codecentral/ccweb.exe/listing?id=12560|BDE setup for Peer-To-Peer(Non-Dedicated) Networks]
[link|http://codecentral.borland.com/codecentral/ccweb.exe/listing?id=12538|Some current internal limits of BDE]
If all else fails, maybe this will help you get at your data without using Paradox and the BDE: [link|http://www.logicomm.it/en/pdxhak.html|PdxHak and PdxHakRecover]