what version are you using because the problem for me was fixed by checking all permissions, paths, making sure all files that are uploaded in ascii are uploaded in ascii and lastly,
doing this
2) Open ubb_lib.cgi in a text editor(notepad will work).
3) Look for line 15 $masterCharset = '';
4) Adjust the charset to your proper charset. For most boards in English the charset would be ISO-8859-1 so the line would read
$masterCharset = 'ISO-8859-1';
5) Lastly reupload all cgi-bin files but not variable files!
