Update languages and regions: Localize your Windows images

Article
10/13/2014

Applies To: Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2

To further customize your Windows image, add languages and other region-specific customizations.

Language packs

Each Windows image contains one base language. To add more in-box languages, you can add language packs and language interface packs:

Language packs contain a full set of resources to localize the Windows user interface (UI) based on a language, and can be installed with no other prerequisites. Language packs are available for many common languages; for example, Spanish.
Language interface packs (LIPs) contain a partial set of resources, and require a specific base language or language pack to already be installed. For example, Catalan Spanish requires that the Spanish language pack be installed.

Downloading Windows and Office language packs and LIPs

OEMs and System Builders who have Microsoft Software License Terms can download language packs and LIPs from the Microsoft OEM site or the OEM Partner Center.
IT Professionals can download language packs from the Microsoft Volume Licensing Site.
After Windows is installed, users can add additional languages from the Control Panel.

After Office is installed, users can get additional languages from the Office website.

For more info, see Available Language Packs for Windows.

Note

For the following regions, the region codes for the Windows and Office language packs do not match:

Serbian Latin: Use the Windows sr-latn-rs and the Office sr-latn-cs language packs. These language packs are both Serbian Latin localizations.
Chinese (Hong Kong SAR): Use the Windows zh-hk and the Office zh-tw language packs. There is no separate localized version of Office for the Chinese (Hong Kong SAR) language.
English (United Kingdom): Use the Windows en-gb and the Office en-us language packs. There is no separate localized version of Office for the English (United Kingdom) language.

For the cases where a separate localized version of Office is not available: When you start with a base Windows image (for example, en-us), and then add the localized image (for example, en-gb), the Office language pack (Singlelanguagepackhsplus.exe) might not install because it is already in the image.

Windows RE language packs are included with the Windows ADK. Windows RE does not support LIPs.

Install language packs

When you add more languages to your image, your customer will receive a choice of languages during Out of Box Experience (OOBE). You can further customize OOBE with language-specific versions of your branding, logos, and license agreement.

We recommend that you add a maximum of ten language packs to a Windows image. Multiple language packs increase the size of the Windows image and also affect the overall performance of a system during deployment and servicing.

Create a new copy of the image

On your technician PC, make another copy of your image for your region.
```
copy C:\Images\ModelSpecificImage.wim C:\Images\ModelSpecificImage-CatalanRegion.wim
```
This can take several minutes.

Mount the Windows and Windows RE images

Mount the Windows image:

Dism /Mount-Image /ImageFile:C:\Images\ModelSpecificImage-CatalanRegion.wim" /Name:"Fabrikam" /MountDir:"C:\mount\windows"

Where C is the drive letter of the drive that contains the image and Fabrikam is the name of the image.

Mount the Windows RE image:

Dism /Mount-Image /ImageFile:"C:\mount\windows\Windows\System32\Recovery\winre.wim" /index:1 /MountDir:"C:\mount\winre"

Update the Windows image

Add language packs to the Windows image:
```
Dism /Add-Package /Image:"C:\mount\windows" /PackagePath:"C:\SampleLanguagePack\Spanish_es-es\lp.cab"
```
where C:\SampleLanguagePack\Spanish_es-es\lp.cab is the path to a Windows language pack.

Add LIPs to the Windows image. To add a language pack by using DISM, rename the file by changing the file name extension from .mlc to .cab and then add the package.

rename "C:\SampleLanguagePack\Catalan_ca-es\lp.mlc" "C:\SampleLanguagePack\Catalan_ca-es\lp.cab"

Dism /Add-Package /Image:"C:\mount\windows" /PackagePath:"C:\SampleLanguagePack\Catalan_ca-es\lp.cab"

Change the regional settings in the mounted image to match the language that your customer prefers. The code below sets the Windows defaults to the Catalan region (ca-es):
```
Dism /Image:"C:\mount\windows" /Set-AllIntl:ca-es
```

Update the Windows RE image

List the components in the Windows RE tools image:
```
Dism /Get-Packages /Image:"C:\mount\winre"
```

Review the resulting list of packages, and then add the corresponding language packs for each package in the image, including the base Windows PE language pack that is included with Windows RE.

For example, the following code shows how to add the Spanish (es-es) language pack to the base Windows RE image, and then to each of the optional components that are present in the default Windows RE image for Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2:

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\lp.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-Rejuv_es-es.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-EnhancedStorage_es-es.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-Scripting_es-es.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-SecureStartup_es-es.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-SRT_es-es.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-WDS-Tools_es-es.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-WMI_es-es.cab"

Dism /image:C:\mount\winre /add-package /packagepath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es\WinPE-StorageWMI_es-es.cab"

Tip

To quickly add all of the packages that are related to a specific language, you can add the entire language-specific folder at one time, even if you won't use all of the packages in it:
Dism /Add-Package /Image:"C:\mount\winre" /PackagePath:"C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\8.1\Assessment and Deployment Kit\Windows Preinstallation Environment\amd64\WinPE_OCs\es-es"
You'll probably see some error messages that say: “The specified package is not applicable to this image”; this is normal. The unneeded packs won't be installed.

Change the regional settings in the mounted image to match the language that your customer prefers. The code below sets the Windows RE language to Spanish:
```
Dism /Image:"C:\mount\winre" /Set-AllIntl:es-es
```

Update branding and license agreements for the Out of Box Experience (OOBE)

Create a language-specific folder for your OOBE files; for example, C:\mount\windows\Windows\System32\Oobe\Info**\Default\ca-es\**.
Copy the sample OOBE.xml file from Windows Deployment sample OOBE.xml file, and save it in this folder.
Copy the sample license agreement, save it as a rich text format (RTF) file, and save it as Fabrikam_eula.rtf in the same folder. (Or, to use your own filename, edit the OOBE.xml file, updating the XML entry for: <eulafilename>).
To set other keyboard information and default time zones, see Configure Oobe.xml.
To create localized versions of your help and support information, see Customize Help and Support.

Unmount the images

Close all applications that might access files from the image, such as Windows SIM.

Commit the changes and unmount the Windows RE image:

Dism /Unmount-Image /MountDir:"C:\mount\winre" /Commit

Check the new size of the Windows RE image.
```
Dir "C:\mount\windows\Windows\System32\Recovery\winre.wim"
```
If the size of the partition is greater than 250MB, modify the deployment script: CreatePartitions-<Firmware>.txt with the new value, adding 50MB to the final size. For more info, see Configure UEFI/GPT-Based Hard Drive Partitions.
```
rem == 1. Windows RE tools partition ===============
create partition primary size=330
```

Commit the changes and unmount the Windows image:

Dism /Unmount-Image /MountDir:"C:\mount\windows" /Commit

Microsoft Office languages

To add Office language packs and LIPs, you’ll need to boot the PC into audit mode and install the files from the Desktop. For more info, see Use online servicing to test the PC and add build-to-order apps and drivers.

Verify customizations for drivers, packages, and languages

Deploy the image to a test PC

From your technician PC, copy the new model-specific image to the external USB hard drive.

copy C:\Images\ModelSpecificImage-CatalanRegion.wim E:\Images\ModelSpecificImage-CatalanRegion.wim

From the model-specific reference PC, use the same procedure and script that you used in Apply Windows images to boot to Windows PE and to deploy the new image from the external USB hard drive:
```
diskpart /s E:\Deployment\CreatePartitions-<Firmware>.txt

E:\Deployment\ApplyImage-<Firmware> E:\Images\ModelSpecificImage-CatalanRegion.wim
```
where E is the drive letter of the external USB hard drive and <firmware> is UEFI or BIOS.
Type exit. The PC reboots.

Verify regional settings

After installation completes, if the Languages screen appears and shows the languages that you selected, then the base language pack has been added correctly.
Continue through the OOBE screens using the Catalonia region to verify that other settings in your license agreement and other settings defined in the OOBE.xml file are set correctly.
Click Start, type intl.cpl, and open intl.cpl. The Region control panel appears. Review the settings on this page to make sure the regional settings are set correctly.

Verify recovery image settings

Open the advanced recovery menus. These steps vary by language:
- Windows 8.1: Settings > Change PC Settings > Update & recovery > Recovery > Advanced startup: Restart now.
- Windows 8: Settings > Change PC settings > General > Advanced startup: Restart now.
When the advanced startup menus appear, if they prompt you with a choice of languages, then languages have been correctly added to the Windows RE image.

Compare your image

See how your new languages and settings affect system performance by using Windows Assessment Tools. For more info, see the Windows Assessment Console Step-by-Step Guide.