Windows 7: Japanese Windows displays strange dates

I downloaded and did a fresh install of the Japanese Language Version of Windows 7 RC when it was released. I live in Japan and speak/read/write reasonable Japanese, but using computers in Japanese was always a slow process so installed on my personal computer for practice.

The problem(s) I am having is that dates are not displayed correctly - in anything. A screenshot explains better (please see attachment)

The entire operating system is in Japanese (i.e. I did not just download the language pack - not sure if there would be a difference). I have installed UK keyboard settings which are loaded by default.

The second problem is that many applications seem to have trouble displaying dialog boxes correctly. Installation wizards of programs are paticularly suceptable to this one. The text within them is replaced by a string of question marks or random combinations of italic f...Again a screenshot explains better.



The final screenshot shows the f problem. Shot was taken from mediamonkey since after installing Windows decided to destroy the perfect tagging for me entire music collection...weeks later and I still have files like this floating around.

Any help would be much appreciated other than suggesting I reinstall the English version of Windows.

Hi and welcome to sevenforums

Having nothing but gut feelings to guide me I have a feeling that since you have UK keyboard and Japanese Win 7, its loosind something when trying to translate. The language pack might help as might a diff keyboard layout.

Haven't a clue maybe someone with more experiience will kick in

Ken

Thanks for welcome and quick reply:-) I also suspect it may be the keyboard settings or (exact naming I can't recall) default regional settings. (i.e. when I Installed it asked me what region for correct display of currency, times etc - to which (since I go to University in the UK) I responded UK.

And last time I checked 'Tuesday' is not a Japanese word...so its getting confused somewhere.

Any more thoughts on my problem, I haven't had any joy yet.

I think you should put Time And Date (when asked) to Japan and Yen for money. I don't know what is the actual difference from a Japanese computer and UK computer :\

If it's not a problem, I would re-install only to see if the problem would go away.

Also, I would try to download the English Version and download the Japanese Language Pack to see if it will fix it.

Myself, I have the 7 RC in French. I could try to install the Japanese language to see if the problems occurs on my side... ...when I'll reboot on my Windows 7

Once I changed and restarted the original weird looking date format dissapeared (as an option) completely, a couple of programs are complaining about wrong dateformats but at least it looks normal now!

The question marks still have me stumped however.

The question marks are there because the installer isn't unicode for some reasons.

Hi. I think you answered your own question here. To explain what I mean, I have to tell my situation:

I am a native Finnish speaking person, living in Germany with a German wife, working using English and Swedish. I´ve installed English Windows 7 plus additional language packs for Finnish, Swedish and German.

To get date and time right, to correspond with operating system language, you have to set location to a country using same language than your operating system, in this case Windows 7. Because I´m using Windows 7 in English, I chose UK for location even I´m located in Germany. In my case it is UK and not USA because it also affects what kind of ads you get on web-pages and I´d rather watch European ads and additional information than American, living here in Europe. (Image 1)

For date and time format I have to choose a format from an English speaking country as well to get it right. I use US-format for date and time, modifying only the clock to use 24-hour system. (Image 2)

Same thing with my computers Finnish and Swedish Guest-accounts, and my wifes German user-account. Location on Finnish account Finland and format Finnish, on German account Germany and German, and on Swedish account Sweden and Swedish. Only this way every user account shows time and date right, corresponding with chosen operating system language.

Additional bonus is that IE8 looks always the location of the current user account, and different users of this computer get i.e. Hotmail and msn.com in their chosen language.

Worth to try?

Image 1:


Image 2:

That seems to have done the trick!

I have successfully realized Windows 7 system with Japanese UI on a machine with English keyboard. I installed English version of Windows 7 and added(installed) Japanese language pack. I did this with three different machines(one desktop and two notebooks).