is this some option i can turn off? it is weird-- the following show up normally: "Folder", "A", "A Folder" but then "AFW" appears as "afw".
Type "case" (without quotes) into the filter at the bottom of the Preferences window and it should find the option you want to change.
("Modify display of all-uppercase filenames." Explorer has, or at least had in the past, a similar option, mostly to de-ugly pre-Win95 drives which were all upper-case.)
that was it! thanks.