Japanese showing up as gibberish despite computer and locale being in Japanese

Question

I recently had to get a fresh install of Windows 11 (unrelated hardware issues, needed new motherboard) and when I got it back it and after finishing setting it up, Japanese text does not display correctly in older programs, even with the locale set to Japanese (Japan), and even with the computer's language set to Japanese.

EDIT: I just noticed some of my text got erased when posting so want to clarify:

• I set my computer's region to Japanese when setting it up
• Yes I installed the Japanese language pack
• Yes I set my locale to Japanese
• I tried out the UTF-8 but it did not work so I turned it back off
• Yes my computer's language is set to Japansee

Despite all of this, the problem still persists.

Answer 1

Hi Meerkat,

Sorry nothing worked again. It seems there's now a different problem than encoding. The encoding is correct and the mojibake issue is solved. We have "Cannot open Synthesis Engine" issue now. This is may be due to missing 32-bit runtime components, COM registration failure, Old DRM / driver dependency that is blocked by Windows 11 or voicebank registry paths broken. The issue that's occurring to Vocaloid1 and Vocaloid 2 are they are both 32-bit only, dependent on old Microsoft runtimes, dependent on properly registered COM components and these are apps that are XP and Vista time. When compatibility mode is enabled, Windows isolates registry and file paths, which is why voicebanks stop loading.

Let's not use compatibility mode anymore.

A. Install required 32-bit Runtimes. Even on 64-bit Windows, VOCALOID1/2 need 32-bit versions.

Install all of these x86 versions:

1. Visual C++ 2005 x86
2. Visual C++ 2008 x86
3. Visual C++ 2010 x86
4. DirectX 9.0c End-User Runtime June 2010

Even if newer versions are installed, these specific legacy ones matter.

Reboot after installing.

B. Manually re-register the engine.

1. Open Command Prompt as Administrator.
2. Navigate to VOCALOID install directory.
3. Look for something like: VOCALOID2\Editor\ VOCALOID2\Engine\
4. If you find a .dll related to synthesis engine (often something like VOCALOID2Engine.dll), run: regsvr32 filename.dll
5. If it succeeds, reboot.

C. Install outside Program Files.

1. Windows 11 protects: C:\Program Files\
2. Old software hates that.
3. Uninstall VOCALOID completely.
4. Reinstall to something simple like: C:\VOCALOID2\
5. NOT Program Files.
6. Reinstall voicebanks after.
7. Reboot.

D. Check if engine service exists

1. Press Win + R
2. Type: services.msc
3. See if anything related to VOCALOID, Yamaha, Synthesis Enginen exists and is stopped.
4. If present, set to Automatic and start it.

Please update me.

Regards,
Jhun

Answer 2

Hi Meerkat,

The problem is specific to how these old programs are being launched. Since this is an English base install of Windows 11, here are some remaining causes and fixes.

VOCALOID2 and similar older software:

1. Uses Shift-JIS (CP932)
2. Was designed for Windows XP/Vista era
3. Sometimes misbehaves on modern English Windows builds even with correct locale
4. Explorer works because it’s fully Unicode and old installers are not.

So we need to force compatibility behavior.

A. Run installer in Japanese compatibility mode.

1. Right-click the installer EXE
2. Click Properties
3. Go to Compatibility
4. Enable: Run this program in compatibility mode for: Select Windows 7
5. Also enable: Run as administrator
6. Click Apply
7. Try again. Old InstallShield installers especially need this.

B. Verify system code page is actually 932.

1. Open Command Prompt and type: chcp
2. If it says: Active code page: 65001 That means UTF-8 is still effectively active somewhere.
3. It should say: Active code page: 932
4. If it does not say 932, tell me what number it shows.

C. Check Welcome screen locale sync. Sometimes Windows only changes locale for your account, not the system.

1. Go to, Control Panel > Region > Administrative tab.
2. Click: Copy settings…
3. Make sure these are enabled (checked): Welcome screen and system accounts New user accounts
4. Restart.

D. For Checking.

1. Open Command Prompt and run: systeminfo | find "System Locale"
2. It should say: ja-jp
3. If it says en-us, that’s the root problem.

Answer 3

Hi Meerkat,

May i know some details of the situation:

1. Was Windows installed in English first?
2. Is the UTF-8 checkbox currently on or off?
3. Does File Explorer show Japanese filenames correctly?

Jhun

Answer 4

Hi Meerkat,

Good day. I'm Jhun an independent advisor. In regards with your Windows Language issue, try to do these steps in order and see if it will fix the problem.

A. Make sure system locale is set to Japanese. Non-Unicode Programs. Even if Windows display language is Japanese, older programs (like VOCALOID2) use the system locale, not the UI language.

1. Press Win + R
2. Type: intl.cpl
3. Go to the Administrative tab
4. Click Change system locale…
5. Set it to: Japanese (Japan)
6. Click OK
7. Restart your PC
8. This ensures Windows uses Code Page 932 (Shift-JIS) for legacy software.

B. Important step. Turn OFF the UTF-8 Beta option. Older Japanese software often breaks if UTF-8 mode is enabled.

1. In the same Change system locale window, make sure this is unchecked: Beta: Use Unicode UTF-8 for worldwide language support
2. If it’s checked: Uncheck it
3. Restart your computer
4. This is the most common cause of garbled Japanese text in old installers.

C. Confirm Japanese is installed properly.

1. Go to Settings > Time and Language > Language & Region.
2. Make sure: a. Japanese language pack is fully installed. b. Speech and handwriting components aren’t stuck downloading. c. Japanese is listed correctly.
3. If unsure: a. Remove Japanese. b. Restart. c. Reinstall Japanese language pack.
4. Restart again.

D. Make sure you rebooted after changes. System locale changes do nothing until a full restart happens. A shutdown isn’t always enough if Fast Startup is enabled — use: Restart specifically.

E. If Windows was installed in English. If your Windows 11 installation was originally English and you added Japanese later, that’s fine, but the system locale still must be manually set to Japanese, see Fix A.

F. As a last resort if nothing works, do a clean Japanese Windows install.

1. Download the official Japanese Windows 11 ISO
2. Do a clean install with Japanese as the base system language
3. This guarantees: a. Correct default code page b. Proper legacy compatibility
4. This is rarely necessary, but it permanently eliminates encoding issues.

I hope this helps.

Regards,
Jhun