head and |more

When I run head, windows 2003 server standard edition, in the command 
box I see text on the screen.
When I use: "head a.txt |more" I get mostly ?????  with one recognizable 
character here and there.
The same when I do: "head a.txt > b.txt" and then I do: "type b.txt" I 
see mostly ?????????

I probably have this problem with all the tools.
I checked csplit, cat, fmt, head.

-- 
Adar Yechiel
Rechovot, Israel