Or for fans of Tivos...

If you have a standalone or DirecTivo that is hacked and is running vserver, you can use tivotool to extract shows to a linux box in MPEG format, and then use any other tool to transcode to MPEG4 (I prefer DVD::rip, but transcode or mencoder work just as well).

Just make sure you stick to the resolution constraints of the Real player and you'll be fine. The 770 blows the iPod w/ video away as far as screen real estate and per-show costs (free vs. $2/ea)