"Computer name cannot contain only numbers" error message when you install Windows 7 by using Windows 7 SP1 integrated installation media

Symptoms

Consider the following scenario:

You try to install Windows 7 by starting the computer from installation media that is integrated with Windows 7 Service Pack 1.
During the initial installation, you set the Time and Currency Format setting to a locale other than English, Finnish, German, or Swedish. Or, the locale was selected for you before you purchased your computer.
A computer name that contains non-ASCII characters is entered in the Out of Box Experience (OOBE) Wizard.

In this scenario, you receive an error message that resembles the following:

Computer name cannot contain only numbers, may not be identical with the user name and cannot contain spaces. Retype the name of the computer.

Note See the "More information" section for a list of accepted characters.A computer name that contains non-ASCII characters may be entered during the OOBE Wizard in one of the following situations:

You manually enter a computer name that contains a non-ASCII character.
You manually enter a user name that contains a non-ASCII character.Note The default computer name is automatically generated based on the user name. Therefore, if the user name contains a non-ASCII character, the default computer name will also contain a non-ASCII character.
Your language setting is Russian, Croatian, Ukrainian, or Thai.Note The default computer name is automatically generated by appending “-PC” to the user name. In Russian, Croatian, Ukrainian, or Thai, the translation of “-PC” contains non-ASCII characters. Therefore, the default computer name will also contain non-ASCII characters.

Resolution

The hotfix package is recommended for OEMs and enterprises that build Windows 7 installation images. If you are a user who experiences this issue, click here to view the methods that are described in the "Workaround" section.

Hotfix information

A supported hotfix is available from Microsoft. However, this hotfix is intended to correct only the problem that is described in this article. Apply this hotfix only to systems that are experiencing the problem described in this article. This hotfix might receive additional testing. Therefore, if you are not severely affected by this problem, we recommend that you wait for the next software update that contains this hotfix.If the hotfix is available for download, there is a "Hotfix download available" section at the top of this Knowledge Base article. If this section does not appear, contact Microsoft Customer Service and Support to obtain the hotfix. Note If additional issues occur or if any troubleshooting is required, you might have to create a separate service request. The usual support costs will apply to additional support questions and issues that do not qualify for this specific hotfix. For a complete list of Microsoft Customer Service and Support telephone numbers or to create a separate service request, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

http://support.microsoft.com/contactus/?ws=supportNote The "Hotfix download available" form displays the languages for which the hotfix is available. If you do not see your language, it is because a hotfix is not available for that language.

Prerequisites

To apply this hotfix, you must have a Windows 7 installation image that is integrated with Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1).For more information about how to obtain a Windows 7 or a Windows Server 2008 R2 service pack, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

976932 Information about Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 and for Windows Server 2008 R2

Registry information

To use the hotfix in this package, you do not have to make any changes to the registry.

Restart requirement

You do not have to restart the computer after you apply this hotfix.

Hotfix replacement information

This hotfix does not replace a previously released hotfix.

File information

The global version of this hotfix installs files that have the attributes that are listed in the following tables. The dates and the times for these files are listed in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). The dates and the times for these files on your local computer are displayed in your local time together with your current daylight saving time (DST) bias. Additionally, the dates and the times may change when you perform certain operations on the files.

Windows 7 file information notes

The files that apply to a specific product, milestone (RTM, SPn), and service branch (LDR, GDR) can be identified by examining the file version numbers as shown in the following table:

Version	Product	Milestone	Service branch
6.1.760 1.17xxx	Windows 7	SP1	GDR
6.1.760 1.21xxx	Windows 7	SP1	LDR

GDR service branches contain only those fixes that are widely released to address widespread, extremely important issues. LDR service branches contain hotfixes in addition to widely released fixes.
The MANIFEST files (.manifest) and the MUM files (.mum) that are installed for each environment are listed separately in the "Additional file information for Windows 7" section. MUM and MANIFEST files, and the associated security catalog (.cat) files, are extremely important to maintain the state of the updated components. The security catalog files, for which the attributes are not listed, are signed with a Microsoft digital signature.

For all supported x86-based versions of Windows 7

File name	File version	File size	Date	Time	Platform
Msoobeui.dll	6.1.7601.17591	1,115,136	08-Apr-2011	07:29	x86
Msoobeui.dll	6.1.7601.21700	1,115,136	08-Apr-2011	06:39	x86

For all supported x64-based versions of Windows 7

File name	File version	File size	Date	Time	Platform
Msoobeui.dll	6.1.7601.17591	1,161,728	08-Apr-2011	07:36	x64
Msoobeui.dll	6.1.7601.21700	1,161,728	08-Apr-2011	07:24	x64

Workaround

To work around this issue, use one of the following methods.

Method 1 (recommended for general users)

Manually delete any non-ASCII characters from the computer name. This includes strings that are generated automatically. The computer name may contain letters (from "a" through "z" and from "A" through "Z"), numbers (from 0 through 9), and hyphens ("-"). See the "More Information" section for a list of accepted characters.To manually delete non-ASCII characters from the computer name, you may have to switch to an English keyboard setting. The English keyboard setting is available for all language settings and locales. If the English keyboard setting is not selected by default, you can select it by using the Language bar. For more information about the Language bar, visit the following Microsoft website:

General information about the Language barYou can revert the computer name to a name that contains non-ASCII characters after the installation process is complete. For more information about how to change the computer name, visit the following Microsoft website:

How to change your computer name

Method 2 (recommended for advanced users only)

Restart the OOBE Wizard by using audit mode and Sysprep. You can enter audit mode by pressing CTRL+Shift+F3 at the computer name screen in the OOBE Wizard. For more information about how to enter audit mode, visit the following Microsoft TechNet website:

How to customize Windows in audit modeAfter the computer restarts, start the OOBE Wizard by running the SYSPREP /OOBE command.

Method 3 (recommended for OEM system builders and enterprises only)

Build the Windows installation image by using the Sysprep tool. There are legal requirements for OEM system builders regarding the installation of Windows 7. For example, the Sysprep tool must run when an end-user first uses the computer. This makes sure that Windows Welcome runs. Windows installation images that are built by using the Sysprep tool are not affected by this issue. For more information about Windows 7 system builder, visit the following Microsoft website:

Windows 7 system builder quick start

Method 4 (we recommend this method for OEM system builders and enterprises only)

Force the OOBE Wizard to display the Country/Region/Keyboard settings page by changing the OOBE.xml file. To do this, set the hideRegionalSettings registry subkey to false. For more information about Oobe.xml settings, visit the following Microsoft TechNet website:

General information about Oobe.xml settings

Status

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.

More Information

Accepted character set

Unicode Character
0x002D      -
0x0030      0
0x0031      1
0x0032      2
0x0033      3
0x0034      4
0x0035      5
0x0036      6
0x0037      7
0x0038      8
0x0039      9
0x0041      A
0x0042      B
0x0043      C
0x0044      D
0x0045      E
0x0046      F
0x0047      G
0x0048      H
0x0049      I
0x004A      J
0x004B      K
0x004C      L
0x004D      M
0x004E      N
0x004F      O
0x0050      P
0x0051      Q
0x0052      R
0x0053      S
0x0054      T
0x0055      U
0x0056      V
0x0057      W
0x0058      X
0x0059      Y
0x005A      Z
0x005F      _
0x0061      a
0x0062      b
0x0063      c
0x0064      d
0x0065      e
0x0066      f
0x0067      g
0x0068      h
0x0069      i
0x006A      j
0x006B      k
0x006C      l
0x006D      m
0x006E      n
0x006F      o
0x0070      p
0x0071      q
0x0072      r
0x0073      s
0x0074      t
0x0075      u
0x0076      v
0x0077      w
0x0078      x
0x0079      y
0x007A      z
0x00A1      ¡
0x00B5      µ
0x00C4      Ä
0x00C5      Å
0x00C6      Æ
0x00C7      Ç
0x00C9      É
0x00D1      Ñ
0x00D6      Ö
0x00DC      Ü
0x00DF      ß
0x00E4      ä
0x00E5      å
0x00E6      æ
0x00E7      ç
0x00E9      é
0x00F1      ñ
0x00F6      ö
0x00FC      ü

For more information about software update terminology, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

824684 Description of the standard terminology that is used to describe Microsoft software updates

Additional file information

Additional file information for Windows 7

Additional files for all supported x86-based versions of Windows 7

File name	Update.mum
File version	Not applicable
File size	1,443
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	20:16
Platform	Not applicable

File name	X86_1d66ac0d7717891e07ee260726166f2b_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17591_none_39466c54783cc49e.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	703
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	20:16
Platform	Not applicable

File name	X86_32e6f672bef3dc39cd628f209126edeb_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.21700_none_9b985c2f16986e19.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	703
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	20:16
Platform	Not applicable

File name	X86_microsoft-windows-oobe-machine-ui_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17591_none_640917db40366558.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	14,299
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	08:21
Platform	Not applicable

File name	X86_microsoft-windows-oobe-machine-ui_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.21700_none_64f3058e590bed79.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	14,299
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	07:15
Platform	Not applicable

Additional files for all supported x64-based versions of Windows 7

File name	Amd64_75e9dc3d5343183cf302cde46470b570_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.21700_none_ad9c53451596595e.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	707
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	20:16
Platform	Not applicable

File name	Amd64_ada5f12503f4fe34ccf2108d4a3003e2_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17591_none_f4df5f2e9c1f7da2.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	707
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	20:16
Platform	Not applicable

File name	Amd64_microsoft-windows-oobe-machine-ui_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17591_none_c027b35ef893d68e.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	14,303
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	08:47
Platform	Not applicable

File name	Amd64_microsoft-windows-oobe-machine-ui_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.21700_none_c111a11211695eaf.manifest
File version	Not applicable
File size	14,303
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	07:56
Platform	Not applicable

File name	Update.mum
File version	Not applicable
File size	1,451
Date (UTC)	08-Apr-2011
Time (UTC)	20:16
Platform	Not applicable