Since switching to Windows 7 I've had an odd quirk on my laptop. Occasionally, some of the programs stop recognizing Chinese characters. It started with itunes (periodically) but popped up on Skypke yesterday (frustratingly). Using google, I've found others making the same complaint but no clear solutions.

To be clear: the computer still recognizes Chinese in Word documents and and the Chinese langauage pack is installed. It's just that some of the programs can't seem to retain characters. (Oh, the irony.)

I've had the same problem from time to time, but it always fixes itself with a restart. I asked on Microsoft Answers but didn't have any luck. If you figure out what it is, I'd be very interested in the cause of the problem.