I am living in France for a while, and needed a notebook. So I purchased an
HP notebook with Windows Vista Familiale Premium, auto-installed upon
start-up and I made sure I chose English (Anglais) everywhere I could, from
step 1 - but alas, everything stays French. I even created a standard user
account thinking its only the administrator account which stays French.
Nope... not that either.

Can anybody please advise? How come when you buy Enlish Windows it is so
easy to change display language to something else, but when you buy something
in France, then French is all you get?

Also... this is not covered in Windows Tech Support. Advice there is that it
is easy to change display language. Please advise.

Merci & thank you!

There is no change of language in vista home Premium; english, french, or any
other language.
There was none in XP home; nothing has changed.

Ultimate is the way to go, to change languages.
Buy a new Home Premium in English, or upgrade and change it.

"Ivan" wrote:

> I am living in France for a while, and needed a notebook. So I purchased an
> HP notebook with Windows Vista Familiale Premium, auto-installed upon
> start-up and I made sure I chose English (Anglais) everywhere I could, from
> step 1 - but alas, everything stays French. I even created a standard user
> account thinking its only the administrator account which stays French.
> Nope... not that either.
>
> Can anybody please advise? How come when you buy Enlish Windows it is so
> easy to change display language to something else, but when you buy something
> in France, then French is all you get?
>
> Also... this is not covered in Windows Tech Support. Advice there is that it
> is easy to change display language. Please advise.
>
> Merci & thank you!

Only certain versions of Vista have language packs available to download and
install.

"Ivan" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:4B42BE14-5968-4713-847A-(E-Mail Removed)...
>I am living in France for a while, and needed a notebook. So I purchased an
> HP notebook with Windows Vista Familiale Premium, auto-installed upon
> start-up and I made sure I chose English (Anglais) everywhere I could,
> from
> step 1 - but alas, everything stays French. I even created a standard user
> account thinking its only the administrator account which stays French.
> Nope... not that either.
>
> Can anybody please advise? How come when you buy Enlish Windows it is so
> easy to change display language to something else, but when you buy
> something
> in France, then French is all you get?
>
> Also... this is not covered in Windows Tech Support. Advice there is that
> it
> is easy to change display language. Please advise.
>
> Merci & thank you!

Hi Ivan,

You can add language support, but you can't change the installation language
unless:

a) You have or upgrade to Ultimate and then download and install the English
language pack or

b) Purchase and English language version of Vista and install it cleanly.

This is no different from adding support for French into an English language
installation, the base OS language remains the same.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

"Ivan" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:4B42BE14-5968-4713-847A-(E-Mail Removed)...
>I am living in France for a while, and needed a notebook. So I purchased an
> HP notebook with Windows Vista Familiale Premium, auto-installed upon
> start-up and I made sure I chose English (Anglais) everywhere I could,
> from
> step 1 - but alas, everything stays French. I even created a standard user
> account thinking its only the administrator account which stays French.
> Nope... not that either.
>
> Can anybody please advise? How come when you buy Enlish Windows it is so
> easy to change display language to something else, but when you buy
> something
> in France, then French is all you get?
>
> Also... this is not covered in Windows Tech Support. Advice there is that
> it
> is easy to change display language. Please advise.
>
> Merci & thank you!