Won't preserve aspect ratio letterbox?

Hey,
I have a cannon hd camera that films in 1920x1080 which is a 16:9 aspect ratio if I understand correctly. I'm trying to export this video size to a 640x480 using the quicktime conversion. From what I've read online and in the manual if I check "preserve aspect ratio", "letterbox" it should put two black bars on the top and bottom so that the video itself isn't stretched to fit into the 640x480. However, though I've tried many times, the exported video always comes out stretched. Is something turned off that I don't know about? Is there a problem in the software?
Thanks for the help if you can solve this puzzle.

I'm having the same problem and it's driving me nuts. I have HD footage and I'm trying to save a small sample as a demo. I want to email either a 16:9 clip or a 4:3 letterboxed clip. No matter what dimension I export to, it ends up as 4:3, even when "letterbox" is checked. For example, if I export to 720x480 (4:3), it's squashed. But if I export to 720x480 (16:9), it's squashed AND I have black bars ON THE SIDES! So I'm telling FCE to go from 16:9 to 16:9 and it converts it to 4:3 and then puts black borders on the side? How does this make any sense??
When you say "Place your edited widescreen sequence in a 4:3 sequence" what do you mean? I don't see sequence properties that control the aspect ratio.
Also, what should the compression type be? Like I said, I'm just trying to export a small 30-second demo clip. All of my exports are turning out 40+ MB. If I do a straight Export->Quicktime movie (no conversion) then my 30 second clip is more like 400MB.

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However, if the clip will play natively as a QT file, iit can be 16:9 without letterboxing, which has many advantages. The dimesnions I use for this most often are 480x270 That should allow you to get your file down to size at good quality.
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I'm trying to maintain a 16:9 aspect ratio and its driving me nuts! I have a short project in FCP. Sequence is set to 720x480 anamorphic 16:9.
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