Export Settings for Optimum HD Quality

Question

I'm getting back into editing after a couple of years away and having worked up until now with SD DV tapes. I now own a Sony HDR-SR10E Hi-Def camcorder, a brand new iMac with huge screen and more than enough memory/hard disk space, and a copy of FCE updated to work with AVCHD files. (Before the update, although I could preview the camcorder's files in the Log & Transfer window, for some reason FCE wouldn't actually import them when commanded, always giving me the dreaded Error; No Data message. Thankfully, the update fixed that. I work with the preset "AVCHD Apple Intermediate Codec 1920 x 1080i60")
I've just edited my first sequence; a three minute short, and ultimately intend to burn most of my movies to Blu-Ray. I monitor on the iMac, and whereas I used to monitor externally via DV deck and monitors, I've become used to this. My problem, I guess, is what are the ideal export settings to use to achieve a near loss-less movie at the other end of the editing process? "Export To Tape" is obviously redundant for me, so I'm left with "Quicktime Movie" or "Quicktime Conversion". The trouble is, nothing seems to give me the desired result. Plain old Quicktime Movie isn't good enough, leaving the exported movie looking under-resolved and full of horizontal artefacts, especially with moving objects featured. Neither can I find any presets/permutations within Quicktime Conversion that leave me with a half decent result; I'm basically left with files that are better or worse than each other depending on their varying degrees of artefacting!
I'm in the market for a quality external BD Burner and, probably, a copy of Toast Titanium 10 Pro, but there's no point in considering purchasing these until I can export good quality versions of the movies I edit in FCE. Can anybody please advise me as to the best export settings to use?
Thanks

Answer 1

FYI
To anyone interested in this thread, Tom's advice regarding export settings was good;
I exported as a QT movie. I then took a gamble, and bought Toast Titanium 10 Pro, and an LG BE08 external Blu-Ray rewriter, (although it doesn't officially support Mac), thinking that it's "plug-and-play" USB2 connectivity would be pretty universal. Luckily, it seems I was right. I burned the disc using Toast's Blu-Ray plug-in, and the HD playback quality on my PS3 is superb. To my eye it looks pretty much loss-less when compared to an HDMI feed straight from the camcorder to the TV.
The only niggle is that the disc shows up as an "Incompatible Disc" when I try to play it on my three-year-old Sharp Blu-Ray player, so be warned that the older machine may encounter problems!