topic Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language in PCs & Accessories

Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

lazkao — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 17:45:06 GMT

Hi, I bought my Sony VAIO in Germany, which does not necessarily mean that I am German, or that I like German as a language.

Is there any way of getting the English version for this computer? I don't care about having a German keyboard because I have already switched it to Standard, and I know all keys and symbols by heart, but having my OS in German is really a downer.

Any help will be greatly appreciated. Regards,

P X L

(and by the way, English is not my motherlanguage either, but it should be forbidden to translate OS and software into other languages!!!)

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

William — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 17:53:18 GMT

Unfortunately Sony will only be willing to supply a recovery disk in German as it is a German Vaio.

The only feasible alternative is to download the original drivers & utilities (In English) from VAIO-LINK then do a clean install of XP or MCE.

Then add the drivers and utilities after the clean install.

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

lazkao — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 17:55:06 GMT

The computer I am talking about has the following numbers written at the back:

Sony VAIO model PCG - 791 M

I think it is a VGN-FS115M. I bought it about a year ago.

I has a Intel Centrino 1.6 MHz, NVIDIA 6200, 80 GB HDD, and 512 RAM.

I am the first owner, and the only reason I bought it in Germany is because I happen to live there (only for a short time).

I have tried installing win XP in English, but I do not seem to get the soundcard to work, and also I like some of the bundled software.

Thanx again

PXL

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

Thalamus. — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 17:57:29 GMT

Hi lazkao,

welcome to Club Vaio,

Unfortunately Sony do not supply recovery dics in a different language other than the original installed...

A possible solution would be to install a fresh version of MS XP and then download the Preinstalled Drivers and Utilities from Vaio-Link unfortunately you will lose the pre-installed applications...:smileysad:

Edit: sorry started posting before the other two replies...:smileytongue:

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

William — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:03:07 GMT

Hi lazkao,

welcome to Club Vaio,  

Unfortunately Sony do not supply recovery dics in a different language other than the original installed...

A possible solution would be to install a fresh version of MS XP and then download the Preinstalled Drivers and Utilities from Vaio-Link unfortunately you will lose the pre-installed applications...:smileysad:

Edit: sorry started posting before the other two replies...:smileytongue:

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

lazkao — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:03:27 GMT

TRoll: if I install XP in English, then I will loose all the extra software that came bundled with the VAIO. The utilities available for download at e-link are incomplete.

Anyways, I have already tried installing XP, and I had both at the same time, the Win Xp Home in German provided by Sony, and Win Xp Pro in English.

The problem is that Win Xp Pro does not seem to find the drivers within the recovery disk, so the soundcard is dead, for instance.

Any ideas? Is there some charitable soul out there willing to send me a copy of his/her recovery disk? As I said, I am a legit owner of the software... but I cannot stand it being in German!!

Regards,

PXL

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

William — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:10:18 GMT

The easiest way to obtain the Drivers and Utilities is from the link in my earlier post. Pointing XP at the recovery disc for drivers does not work.

When you have extracted the files you should find one for the soundcard as well as all the others.

If you have not formatted your HDD you may find a folder on the C drive labelled Drivers which will contain your drivers.

You are right you will lose some of the preinstalled software but surely they are in German anyway?

However charitable it would seem for someone to send you a copy of their English recovery CD they can't because it is "Piracy".

You are not even allowed to ask,as you have done, on this Forum.

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

lazkao — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:27:23 GMT

Troll: as I said, I didn't steal the software, so what kind of piracy are you talking about? Asking a copy of the very same software in other language is that a crime? Anyway Sony is the world champion of imposing whatever their executives decide to the customer.

And what about Sony not even considering the fact that not everybody living in Germany is German? DVD-drives let you choose the zone you are living in a number of times. I didn't get to choose, not even once.

For instance, I bought a pocket PC the other day and I have the freedom to choose the language that I want.

PXL

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

vsugguu — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:46:35 GMT

i also recently bought a VGN-FE21H laptop in germany and now i installed parellel edition of xp pro in english. I hope if you go to the control panel - System - Properties - harware - Device Manager. Select each hardware, for example ur sound card and go to the menu "Action" in device manager, click scan for hardware changes. it will work. else u chose the sound card and right click to get the properties, there u could upgrade the driver using your recovery cd. if u still having the recovery copy in ur system, this is much easier and it will detect it self . this worked for me.
Best of lucks

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

William — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:52:10 GMT

Troll: as I said, I didn't steal the software, so what kind of piracy are you talking about? Asking a copy of the very same software in other language is that a crime? Anyway Sony is the world champion of imposing whatever their executives decide to the customer.

And what about Sony not even considering the fact that not everybody living in Germany is German? DVD-drives let you choose the zone you are living in a number of times. I didn't get to choose, not even once.

For instance, I bought a pocket PC the other day and I have the freedom to choose the language that I want.
PXL

It is a crime to Sony and Taboo to ask here.

SEE HERE

Recovery disks can sometimes be bought on Ebay but usually for older models - Enough said

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

Thalamus. — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 18:55:18 GMT

Hi lazkao,

Unfortunately we do not make the rules here, Sony do, see below...:smileyhappy:

"Due to legal reasons and licensing agreements, VAIO Link cannot supply customers with Recovery CD-roms that differ in any way to the original product recovery CD-rom (i.e. different language versions, different model versions)."

Software piracy is illegal and therefore should not be publically discussed on this forum.
Read complete Sony Announcement here

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

rich912 — Tue, 22 Aug 2006 21:23:49 GMT

Hi lazkao,

This thread may help you solve your audio driver problem.

Re: Help About Getting The Restore Disc in Other Language

lazkao — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 18:38:36 GMT

Hi. I remember having installed both the original XP and a parallel XP in English.

First of all, let us point out some differences among companies. The first laptop I owned was a Samsung. They provided two CDs with the computer (I wonder how much do they spare by not providing a DVD rom with the software at Sony, because nowadays even inflatable pools come with a cd-rom - no kidding).

One of this CD roms had the OS, the other one drivers for different OS. This means that they already had in mind that the user might want to use another OS, so they provided all drivers up to the last OS known at that time.

Now let us consider Sony. They do not provide any optical media, just some obscure program to create a backup dvd or series of CDs that you have to provide yourself. There is no separate drivers CD, so if you decide to install another OS you are on your own.

I managed, with the recovery disk that I created, to get the drivers for the monitor and some other stuff, but the drivers for the soundcard, well windows searched in that recovery dvd and could not find any.

So each time that I start windows in English I have no sound. So I ended up using that hideous German version...

Enough said. Regards,

PXL