Top 10 Cars for 2008

Whereas it's worked well for me for the last 20+ years. I see all of the red circles for Honda & Toyota, look at them, test drive them, buy a Toyota (based purely on personal preference), & am happy w/ it. I have never understood why a person would research a vehicle, see a slew of red flags (black circles in this case), & yet spend a huge wad of hard-earned $$ on a car which got absolutely lousy ratings by the CR staff &/or the cars' owners.

Cathy

Reply to
Cathy F.
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Ok I remember you dont like CR. But whats wrong with the cars they picked? Are they bad or you just dislike CR?

Reply to
EdV

"EdV" "C. E. White"

Ok I remember you dont like CR. But whats wrong with the cars they picked? Are they bad or you just dislike CR?

EdV

I just noticed he said "CD" in that post - isn't that "Consumer Digest", which accepts ads? Might have been just a typo.

Natalie

Reply to
Wickeddoll®

I meant Consumer Reports (just bad typing). I wasn't just talking cars. In his later years my Father got to the point he only bought "CR" best picks (TVs, Vacuums, Coffee Makers, etc.) and it seem like they were consistently crap. We bought new TVs at the same time - CR liked some Sharp, so he bought one. I bought a Sony. My Sony is far better than the POS Sharp he bought. The CR best pick vacuum my Mother has is a POS.

As for Cars - CR and me have different desires / tastes. I have never figured out exactly what they want. I want a reliable, quiet car, with enough room for me and at least decent looks. They apparently want Toyotas - no matter what that means. My Sister just got a RAV4 - it is nice, and at least part of the reason she got it was because CR loved it (and partially because I told her she should consider it). BUT - The engine is harsh (4 cylinder), it has excessive wind noise (at high speed - 75 mph - but she mostly drives around town), mediocre seats (base model and she is a lot smaller than I am), the worst control layout on the face of the planet (she will get used to it), and it cost thousands more than an Escape or any of the Korean competitors in the segment. CR seemed to completely gloss over the deficiencies that I find most annoying (bad seats, horrible control layout, wind noise). Will the vehicle be reliable - I expect it to be, but then my other Sister has a 2001 Escape. So far it has been trouble free. The only significant repair was a brake booster last fall (not bad for a 6+ year old vehicle).

It seems to me that people give far to much credit to the little circles CR uses. First of all, the data collection scheme is crap - non-scientific and more a popularity contest than a statistically valid survey. Second, the presentation method over-emphasizes differences. If you look at the more detailed information, the difference in the top 20 "brands" is trivial, and likely to be well within the accuracy of the CR survey. Interestingly, if you look at the CR model spread for Toyota and Ford, Ford does better than Toyota on the low end (the worst Toyota models are worse than the worst Ford models). Also Toyota is rated ahead of Lexus and well behind Scion - which seems ridiculous. And Subaru finished ahead of Toyota in their overall manufacturer rating. Do you really think Subarus are more reliable than Toyotas? I don't.

Bottom line - I would agree that Toyotas are reliable. BUT, so are almost all other cars from major manufacturers. There are glaring exceptions (BMWs, Land Rovers, Mercedes) but in general if you stick with a model that has been on the market for a couple of years from a major US or Asian manufacturer, reliability will not be a concern. Answer me this - If you leave reliability out of the equation (since I think this is a trivial concern), what is the chief reason for picking a Toyota?

Ed

Reply to
C. E. White

It is not scientific, it based on consumers report, consumers will just report what experiences they have had. I dont see the point in paying for it, you can get alot of consumer reports from walmart.com, target.com, amazon, best buy, etc. for cars there's yahoo autos, msn autos, they all have it.

The way I see it, Toyota is ahead of Lexus bec. more people buy Toyotas than Lexus, so more people would give feedbacks on Toyota. It's just a matter of who got the most votes and not the highest rating. Who knows what they did, I could be wrong, but surely Lexus is better than Toyota.

Me too, not more reliable but maybe just the same. Again its just consumer reports, if someone brought their Camry to the outdpoors and just maybe it so happened that there was a bad weather. A guy with a Subaru Legacy will have no problem but a Camry will have some problems. They might not be reporting reliability but just a bad experience. Of course if your Camry got stuck in the road and you see a subaru passing you, you would feel a little disappointed. And that would come up in the next report =3D)

W/out reliability? Ok, I picked the 07 Camry because of the gas mileage and the exterior styling. At the time the Accord, Nissan were all old styling and I wanted a new fresh body style. And besides Toyota has a very wonderful newsgroup that no other manufacturers have (I didn't know of this group at the time of my purchase)

Reply to
EdV

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