Quote Originally Posted by mc12345678 View Post
Couple of things. You say, still uses utf8. I understand that 1.5.x does, but does 1.3.8?

Also, state unable to "install mbstring because not your server", does that mean you do not have access to the php.ini file as it shouldn't take much to activate it,and it is probably already "installed" just not active.
Thanks for following up with me.

I don't know that 1.3.8 does or doesn't. From what I've read to convert to utf8 there is a procedure which replaces charset in English.php to include utf8. Mine has that.
Also in phpadmin there is a change to the structure to utf8, my already has that. I have to assume that somewhere in the upgrade to 1.5 my charset was changed to utf8.

I cannot find the php.ini file on this server. This server is very restrictive with limited access. I guess I may be able to create one and make my own settings, but if it's working I will leave it.

Looks like the mb_internal_encoding() just checks utf8 and if not then easypopulate4.php restricts the input.