Yes, they are in icons and no you can't change to a list view. As far as the font size, my 65 year old eyes have no problem reading them. Again, I wonder about he complainer. If the name of the icon goes beyond the icon size, it truncates with ... You have a choice how to sort the icons on the dvr by pressing the yellow and green buttons on the remote. I currently have Folders by Title and sort by DVR Date. You can also set the sort to Alpha.