DR George, here's a question maybe you can answer: For 16x9 HD material, what does one need to do in order to copy it to DVD-R and retain its 16x9 (anamorphic, if the term applies here) size? Is this something you can do, or would your DVD-R copy come out as letterboxed 4x3? (Does the question make sense?)
You ought to post this at Home Theater Forum.
That said, I have an HDMI button on my remote/HDD player/recorder. I think, but cannot recall for certain, that anything that was widescreen or filled the screen when I watched it while recording also dubbed down that way, as well.
Will have to check on it, though.