non-Unicode programs under user account [Win XP Pro]

Hello everyone,
I hope this is a right place for that kind of question.

I was looking for the answer on my problem for hours with no success. You are my last resort guys :-).

I'm using a localized (Polish) version of XP Professional with SP3. I have 2 accounts: one with the admin rights and a second one with restricted user privileges (it's used for every day work). The problem, I'm facing now, concerns non-Unicode programs run under restricted user account. Menus in these applications are not displayed properly (they are full of hashes). The problem doesn't occur on the admin account. The advanced properties of Regional and Language Options are set except "Apply all settings to the current user account and to the default user profile" option. This one can't be selected permanently - each time I start the Regional and Language Options applet this option turns to unchecked.
I tried the following:
1. I changed the user account into an admin type temporally and start applications.
2. I run these applications on user account but with admin privileges (Run as command).
3. I created a brand new admin account and run the programs.

Non of them helped (even a third one???).

The only way to use these applications with correct menus is to run them on the admin account that was set as a first account during an operating system setup process.

Do you have any clues? Thanks in advance for your help.
Regards,
gordom