I am not fond of DBIx::Class, as it can be fairly complicated. There are so many places customization and configuration can reside it can take a while before you find what you are looking for. You should really think of it as its own application rather than easy to use modules.

I can understand why they made some of the decisions that did. It was supposed to be generic enough to support most databases and what every database designs someone came up. To address these problems required some patch-work coding which made it messier than it needed to be.

Basically, if you have a relatively good design you can get through DBIx::Class with only a few headaches. If you have a crappy design, your going to have a lot of headaches. I still suggest that you learn the in and outs of DBIx::Class because it will be easier than creating your own solution.