As you are all painfully aware, I'm doing a big batch of tests dubbing and encoding into my DSR-1500A. As I've discovered, doing a downconvert form HDV to DV causes the footage to be squeezed into 4x3. Any thoughts on how to fix that going into a DSR Deck?

What do you want to 'fix'? The Squeeze is the normal way to fit 16:9 material in a SD environment. Perfectly for a widescreen tv. What do you want? Letterboxed material? undoable with the DSR1500A only. The best method is to go via a NLE first then unfortunately..

Bummer, I had hoped to modify the incoming signal, essentially unsqueezing the signal in the DSR. I'll flip through the Video commands but I suspect Vincent you are right, going through NLE is now my only option. Unless I want to drop a ton of Resize effects onto my Avid timeline. Which I would rather not do.

A Sony Z1 can output letterboxed DV, so if your material is simple 1080i 60 or 50, then you might consider that camera to do a pull down..