Thanks for the link, JoyMonkey.  I've been using FlaskMPEG .6 by Alberto Vigata with a lot of success.  
Shmokes, I had the synchronisation problem in the beginning, as well.  But, if you check your framerate, you should be able to find one that will be perfect for 99% of the movies you are converting.  At least that's been my experience.  Also, Divx 4, the low-motion one from Nimo's Codec Pack is what I have, has a better texturing engine than Divx 5 or Xvid, in my experience.  Also, I use an external program called AdvBitRate to calulate the bitrate to get it to fit precisely on a CD.
Good luck.
Cheers,
KenToad