Preparations.

It's not enough to just launch the installer!

This was supposed to be the first, but I am hopeless, huh...

And also, welcome to my new VM that I made.

We're going to be using Windows 10 for this install, and any showcases made by me afterwards, as it is both modern enough and still holds on to the old designs, making it span a large variety of windows installs.

First, let's explain why this page exists in the first place. UTAU, at its core, was made by a japanese guy, for a japanese audience, and only later did Ameya add an English translation amongst the downloads.

Now, the japanese Windows installations are setup differently to many other countries, so we have to do a little bit on our end to make the program, and its plugins, work correctly.

I will warn you now: This will mess a bit with your machine, but just about everything is possible to get around. So let's talk just a teeny bit about the effects, shall we?

Since we're going to be messing with system locale, this means that some programs and certain installers will change their language in what they THINK is user-friendliness. If you already know japanese from the get-go, then this should be no issue to navigate.

Some other niche programs might refuse to work or install, but if you're just a regular computer user, this shouldn't be an issue, as I've only discovered ONE program that refused to install. These changes are reversible, but I hold no responsibility should some vital data be lost, so honestly, just make a backup.

Finally, and this is a small one, your command line will change its font, and some elements may change.
This is how my command line looks after install:

Other than just messing a bit with how some programs display language (most notably installers and some badly made programs), then the chances of things going haywire are minimal.
If you're some youngster that only really uses their web browser and some chat apps, or even a gamer using Steam, then this shouldn't have any effect.
However, if you're using MMD, and you haven't done this already, then this is a great boost since models won't break if they're japanese.

Okay, time to turn our machine into a weeb.

By the way, for these tutorials I will be using an english language install instead of norwegian or japanese, you can simply translate in your mind if your machine is a different language, or search up this process elsewhere.

There are two ways to get to where we want, however we will be using the quickest way.

First, open up the control panel. This can be done easily by searching up Control Panel in the Windows Search, aka the search bar (or button) right next to the Windows Logo in Windows 10.

Other versions may search differently, I know that in Windows 7 it's in the Start menu. No idea in Windows 11, I will never touch that OS.

After searching it up, the Control Panel should appear. Click that, and then you should be brought to the Control Panel window. In here you can do lots of stuff, but you're going to want to bring your eyes over to the Clock and Region setting.

I've highlighted it here, but the importiant thing is clicking the blue text under it, the "Change date, time or number formats" setting. If you were impatient and clicked the Clock And Region, you should easily be able to find the setting under the Region setting.

Now you'll be seeing the Region window. This lets you set formats and other things.

Now, there's two things we'll need to do here. First is to change the system locale, but also to check and maybe correct the decimal symbol of choice.

Let's change the locale first. Click on the Administrative tab on the top.

You will see this menu, sort of. Click Change Sytsem Locale, which will bring up the Region Settings menu displayed on the image, too. Set that to Japanese.

DO NOT, however, check the Use Unicode UTF-8 for worldwide language support
It kinda breaks everything, or so I heard.

Afterwards, we need to change the decimal sign. Go back to the Formats tab again and click Additional Settings at the bottom. This will bring up this menu:

You need to check if the decimal symbol is not a comma, but a period. This ensures that things work properly, especially some plugins.

When all is said and done, and you've changed the locale to japanese and the decimal symbol to a period instead of a comma, this has now made your machine ready to run UTAU with hopefully no flaws.

Well, now that THAT ordeal is over...
Now is the time to actually install the thing!

Head on over to the installation tutorial and we'll get the thing onto your thing.