Shouldn't make any difference what codecs you have installed if your burning the avi's as data .
It could be any number of things . Cheap media , dvd burner lens dirty , with these 2 problems you usually get the message " power calibration error " .
What version of nero are you using ? Nero 6 is the best , Nero 7 has some issues with it ,if its a legitimate version you could try going to the nero website and getting the latest update .
As said you could encode the avi's into dvd format with dvd santa , i prefer winavi video convertor as its faster .
What speed is your writer , what speed are you trying to burn at , did you try reducing the speed ? What brand of discs are you using ?I always stick with discs using the Ritek g05 dye ( dark purple )