i've d/l some .avi files and they are not working w/ WM or real video. how can i get them to work?

Try downloading the divx alpha player from divx.com and see if that will play them.

http://www.headbands.com/gspot/ will tell you what codecs they use.

If they are damaged .avi files then you might want to try divfix http://divfix.maxeline.com/ HTH