Squeeze 5.0 and CFHD.avi
 

It looks like the latest version of Sorenson Squeeze, 5.0 Pro, will import CFHD 1080i.avi files now. It imports them as 1920x1080 with the correct looking aspect ratio, allows processing and preview from a fairly comprehensive bank of filters, and renders it out to whatever I like without a hiccup so far. I just got the upgrade today and have only played around with a few short test clips, but it looks encouraging. I use Procoder 3 a lot, but it doesn't cover all of the bases. If Squeeze is now going to play well with CFHD, it will definitely fill some gaps for me.

Thanks for the initial report on this, Robert.

Any updates? I'm tired of paying money for Sorenson upgrades that have only worked on cineform part of the time. I'd love to know if this seems to be the upgrade that finally works!

I have done multiple test runs with Squeeze 5.0 Pro- importing Cineform 1080i (from HDV), Cineform 480p, and 480i, compressing to h.264 for iTunes, Apple TV, and iPod/iPhone, as well as m2v for DVD and it seems to do the transcode quickly and flawlessly from Cineform .avi. I just now transcoded a CFHD 1080x1920 avi shot on the XDCam EX, to a high quality Flash (about 700x400). It renedered pretty quickly, and looks great- good detail, sharpness, saturated colors, but with nuance- It looks like the real deal to me. I never used Squeeze much before, since it didn't work with Cineform, but I'm impressed now.
One thing I had a problem with: the Squeeze 5.0 Pro comes with some extra third party "decoding" software. It was not a problem with Squeeze, but created some issues with Premiere CS3 and Procoder 3, on my system anyway. I ended up uninstalling it and everything (including Squeeze) works fine.