ttriolo05

OK, well I bought a new ES330 last week. It's a georgeous Alabaster Metallic with heated and cooled seats, rear sunshade, 6-CD, etc. Passed up on the NAV and Mark Levinson. I too looked at the Acura, the Infiniti G35, Avalon among others. After some pretty good research: Consumer's Reports, forum like this, car reviews, etc. and a couple of test drives, I concluded that the ES was by far the best deal for the money. The Avalon was a close second but I did not like the stying or the interior as much as the ES. The posts about the transmission problems did give me pause, I'll admit but in the end it was not enough to keep me from the ES. When I saw the car with the colors and options that I wanted on my dealer's lot, I couldn't resist. Although I have only been driving it only a week now, I think I made the right choice. Good luck on yours.

The BMW 3 Series is a different breed of car all together. I just traded in my 2001 325i for an '05 ES330 so I guess I'd know. I did have the 5-speed manual which is somewhat of an unfair comparison however. The BMW, even with the smaller 2.5l engine is very quick because that's the way it's set up to be. It will get you in and around traffic like nothing else on the road. As for the "ultimate driving machine" I never realized the hype. It's fun to drive in certain situations like a twisty mountain or coastal road but in heavy city traffic, it's just another car. The ride is hard especially the "sport" edition I had and it went through performance tires like they were made out of marshmellows ( three sets of tires in 55K miles). Mechanically it had it's problems especially with the electric window motors. Had to replace two in less than four years. So far, much happier with the ES even with the lack of power. B)