Vegas interface defaults to Japanese on Vista

DSR wrote on 6/19/2007, 8:13 PM
Hello,

I have downloaded and installed the ENGLISH versions of both Vegas and DVD Architect. To my dismay the interface of both of them is all in Japanese! I am running the Japanese version Vista Home Premium; I have tried experimenting with the language settings but nothing seems to work. When I install on Japanese Windows XP on a different PC the interface is in English. Would greatly appreciate any suggestions you might have.

BTW, Sony provides no support for the pioneers like myself who are using Vista. They promise Vista support in a new VERSION upgrade of Vegas (at somewhat like $USD200, I suppose). Here is my exchange with Sony: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=ajdrdndvjzvm_63ghzk7d.

Many thanks,

Dmitri

Comments

rmack350 wrote on 6/19/2007, 11:12 PM
First of all, you should be persistent and raise hell until you get some sort of resolution. And they actually should be interested in this because it's a potential snafu for the next vista-compatible version. Support cuts into profit margins pretty fast.

Generally, they must be including all the localization files in the install disk and Japanese was automatically installed because that's what their installer detected. I've been toying with localization in Flash and language is detectable programatically. That's what they've done.

Which probably means that the english localization is on the disk as well, maybe in an XML file, maybe with the letters EN in the name, and maybe near a bunch of similar files with things like JP in the name.

And maybe you can get away with copying the "en" file from the disk to the Vegas install and then renaming it with the "jp" name. Just a thought.

Rob Mack
Spot|DSE wrote on 6/20/2007, 7:29 AM
He doesn't have discs, he downloaded the software, which is why this is baffling, unless it's that Vegas doesn't have Vista-compatible language strings.
I don't think being hellious is going to go anywhere, the official line has been, and still is, that Vegas is not Vista-compatible, use Vegas on Vista at your own risk. When Sony ships Vegas for Vista, then being hellious would be a different thing. There is a forum for Vista/Vegas experimenters, just click the "Forums" link above.
rmack350 wrote on 6/20/2007, 8:12 AM
I just looked in my install directory for Vegas and what it has is folders for French, German, and Japanese. In these are DLLs named in a pattern like "noun.noun.resources.dll". It's possible that these are equal to similarly named files in the root directory (without the "resources" part). The experiment would be to back up all the JP files, copy their equivalents into the jp folder, and change their endings to ".resources.dll"

I don't think this is a Vista problem, but because it's Vista they won't help. This is what "unsupported" means - that they aren't allowed to spend one second thinking about it.

DSR, I think you'd have the same problem if it was Windows XP. You're running a Japanese localized system and Vegas rightly detects this and gives you Japanese text. The obvious answer for them would be "Don't do that". Your response (after trying Vegas on a Japanese XP system) should be to make them aware of the fact that overseas users may have systems localized for a language but still prefer to work in their native language. It would be good to provide a preference to allow you to force Vegas to use a language.

My partner is Japanese and we have run across this before. It can be very hard to make things work the way you want.

Rob Mack
rmack350 wrote on 6/20/2007, 8:28 AM
These might be quicker to try:

Option1 - go into the Vegas installation folder and rename the ja-JP folder to something else. Start Vegas and see if it defaults to english when it can't find the japanese folder.

No luck?

Next test - make a copy of the fr folder and name it ja-JP. This is just quicker than finding the root files, copying them to the localization folder, and renaming each of them.
Start Vegas. Is it now in French? if so, then maybe the files are interchangeable and you could now go find the root versions, copy them into the ja-JP folder, and start renaming them.

Rob Mack
rmack350 wrote on 6/20/2007, 10:03 AM
Okay, last points and then I'll quit.

In past experience it was usually quite hard to deal with language issues like this so I wouldn't get your hopes up. However, it looks to me like Vegas is behaving exactly as it should - when you run it on a localized versions of Windows Vegas uses a matching language, if possible. So, even if you were running Vegas on XP, I don't think Sony is obliged to help you. This is a "loose nut behind the wheel" case. Still, complaining about it might trigger an improved design later on that would make Vegas work well in a multilingual facility like a news room.

The answer for you is to run it on an english language version of Windows XP (or maybe Vista if you dare).

I'm going to assume that you are sharing this computer with someone who needs the Japanese localization of Vista, but that you either can't read it or prefer not to because it's inconvenient. In this case I'd look into setting up this system as a dual-boot machine and installing XP on a separate partion or disk. This will require some sort of boot manager which works just like Lilo, Grub, or Bootcamp. I know Windows can do this, but I don't know how it's set up with just Windows installations. It works just fine with Windows and Linux and evidently works fine with Windows and OSX.

Rob Mack