Can't sort chronologically

[Katharine]

In windows explorer, when I click on the date modified button to sort
chronologically, the file are sorted first by month and then by year. So,
Dec 2007 is before Nov 2007, Oct 2007, etc. and then below all these comes
Jan 2008. Is there another way to sort so I actually get the most recent
files first?

 

[Gary Mount]

Are the actual letters instead of numbers showing up in the column ?
On my system the dates show as numbers only, such as 2/1/2008 and are sorted
as expected, in actual chronological order.
Folders are sorted separately from files.

 

[Katharine]

No, the dates show up as numbers - but I get a series like this: 10/22/2007,
8/4/2007, 5/24/2007, 2/5/2008, 2/4/2008, 1/8/2008....etc. Once I get to
2008, everything is sorted normally, but the 2007 files come first. These
are just the files, not the folders. It is crazy and extremely annoying. I
suppose I could put all the files from 2007 in a folder to get them out of
the way, but that is a nuisance.