Eww, gag me. I rented a VUE this weekend for a SE CT-to-Laguardia dash, and that thing absolutely sucked! It was one with the redesigned nose, no AWD, and about 1500 miles on it. It sounded like a tractor with that loud engine which had NO balls whatsoever, the silver trim pieces on the steering wheel were loose, the center console stack stuck out so far to the left that my leg had to be right against it in order to get my foot squarely on the gas pedal, and worst of all, the steering was both loose and twitchy at the same time: there was a HUGE dead spot where you could turn the wheel about 5-10* in either direction with no movement whatsoever, but immediately past that it would dart left or right. It was completely non-linear. I couldn't wait to dump that POS off back onto the Hertz people.
On the other hand, once I got to Chicago/Wisconsin (24 hours late, so no auto show
), I drove my gf's dad's Envoy XL, which had BY FAR the BEST seat heaters I have ever experienced. It was -23* F in the North Woods (we went snowmobiling) and my ass was SWEATING within 2 minutes of turning them on high. I turned them to low, and they were still almost unbearably hot. My Acura's are nowhere near as good. I still think the Envoy is ugly, but his is completely loaded (DVD, V8, leather, etc etc) and it was a great ride for 6 hours to and from the northern compound, handled the snow great, went 90mph on the highway, and was fautless in the cold weather. I'd still rather have a grand cherokee (he's had 2), but the Envoy was great this weekend. It is on its third ECU in 60k miles, however
Edit to add: the VUE I drove did NOT have the Honda motor, BTW.
