Reply To: The Laboratory II – Try Your HTML & ASCII Art Experiments Here

Mods/Editor- I attempted to send this info several hours ago, but it didn’t post. I’m assuming it was skipped or deleted accidentally, since it contains nothing objectionable, and no URLs (although it contains registry info, which to a cursory read-thru, may look like a URL). If I’m missing something, when you don’t post this I’ll get the hint.

qwertyuiop-

Googling windowsi386lang brought up several hits.

The info below is from one that I thought was useful, and addresses your issue:

First, set folder options to see hidden and system folders. Go to the Control Panel/Folder Options, and on the View tab, set the advanced options so you can see hidden and system files.

Specifically:

– Enable (check) “Display the contents of system folders”

– Enable (check) “Show hidden files and folders”

– Disable (uncheck): “Hide protected operating system files (recommended)”

I also recommend that you disable (uncheck) “hide extensions for known file types”. Then open Windows Explorer to C:Windows and see if there is an I386 folder here. You should also see on that is called ServicePackFiles if you have installed either SP1 or SP2. If they are in these locations, continue on. If not, you need to determine where they are before proceeding.

Now, click start/run and type regedit, click ok. Expand the plus (+) signs to reach this key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionSetup

Click on the setup folder so you can see the associated strings in the right pane. Double-click on the one called sourcepath, you should see “C:Windows” (without the quotes) in the valuedata line, but you probably just see your CD drive letter. Change it and click ok. Now check the ServicePackSourcePath, it should read “c:windowsServicePackFiles” (again without the quotes). It probably does, but if not you need to change this one as well. Click ok, then close the registry editor.

Now retry adding the appropriate language(s). What we’ve done here is to redirect the system to look at the hard drive store of the system files rather than prompting to insert the CD. Manufacturers like Gateway commonly place the system files on the hard drive, the recovery CD is provided only as a backup to reinstall the operating system and cannot be used like a retail CD to add system components.

If you are unfamiliar with the registry or regedit, I suggest you don’t try this. Either get someone more knowledgeable, or a pro, to perform the update. If the registry gets “messed up”, you may end up with a dead computer, that will need everything (operating system and software) reinstalled.

Hatzlocha.