I once sold TVs during the time that Admiral advertised that theirs was, "The most expensive television in America, and darn well worth it". That was a lie; they weren't the most expensive, and, IMHO, not worth it. (We referred to the practice as "Cadillac advertising", or, selling the sizzle instead of the steak).

When I had to buy a dozen TVs and VCRs, the price vs quality equation was most interesting. Expensive Sony TVs lacked good sound quality. Other brands had user-unfriendly controls. I found NEC had the best features, their mid-priced VCRs were praised by the 12 agencies who later used them - everything a user could want was easily found on the remote control (even an eject button, not found on any other VCR remote at that time). I wish other manufacturers would better survey their customers before designing their next device.

Are the video files you are downloading now by any chance full DVD resolution (The 7XX is important) i.e 720x576 (PAL) or 704x480 (NTSC). Lots of older DivX/XviD players do not support .avi resolution higher than 640x480.

Reason I'm asking is that Full DVD resolution is more and more starting to become the norm for non-scene content.

Just curious; does PAL present a better image than NTSC? (I guess that makes it obvious that I've not ventured 'cross the pond in quite awhile.)

Yes, but NTSC has better sound. Short version of that is that PAL Audio plays around 4% faster than original i.e. the pitch changes a little.