I have some Varicam footage shot 24 fps. (The tape recording at 1080i/59.94, and project at 1080i/59.94.) There are segments within certain tapes shot at 48 fps in order to achieve slow motion. I heard a rumour that one can digitize into the Symphony at a different frame rate and thereby bypass using a frame rate converter. Does anyone know anything about this?

Correction: the tape is 720p/24 being converted through the deck to 1080i and into 1080i/59.94 project.

Okay, found the answer. This is pretty cool, for anyone needing this feature:

http://avidtechnology.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/avidtechnology.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=72310&p_created=1138819739&p_sid=PATv7k9j&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_lva=&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PWRmbHQ6MSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9NzYsNzYmcF9wcm9kcz0wJnBfY2F0cz0wJnBfcHY9JnBfY3Y9JnBfc2VhcmNoX3R5cGU9YW5zd2Vycy5zZWFyY2hfbmwmcF9wYWdlPTEmcF9zZWFyY2hfdGV4dD1mcmFtZSByYXRl&p_li=&p_topview=1

....And the answer is actually,no. Although you pay more for your Symph and you can now digitize in HD Firewire in 3.0, you actually only have the option to check or uncheck "Preserve Varicam Frames" on a MC Adrenaline HD. (Or Avid Xpress pro 5.2.x, although it doesn't work on our newly converted Xpress pro to MC 2.8 with SDI Mojo.)

You should see this option when running Symphony and not just on MC.

However it's only available when you are inputting via OHCI (1394) and only in 720p projects.  In an earlier post you said you are cross-converting to 1080i before ingesting.  You would have to ingest as 720p in order to take advantage of this feature.