Most people know that for years, BMW's marketing tag line has been: "The ultimate driving machine." For a long time, this strong statement was appropriate. Now, I'm not so sure. After taking our new, redesigned 2012 3 Series over hill and dale during the last few days, I'm thinking the thrill is gone.

You would assume that if an automaker poured millions of dollars into a major redesign of one of its models that the new version would be better than the old one. But more and more, that’s not the case. In fact, a lot of the slip-sliding we’re seeing here at Consumer Reports has been coming from some traditionally high-performing brands, including Honda, Toyota, and Volkswagen. (See our automaker report cards.)

Upscale luxury sedans with the look of sporty coupes have become very fashionable in recent years. These pseudo-coupes are aimed at drivers wanting to combine the style of a two door with a more practical four-door body. Porsche expanded into this burgeoning niche, bringing its sports-car DNA into the realm of sedans, or actually, a hatchback. We recently purchased one to test.

We've enjoyed Mazda3s for years. They've often been the driver's choice for the most fun-to-drive small sedan. And now they're very fuel efficient, as well.

Right now, Chevrolet is selling two very different cars with the same Malibu nameplate. Thing is, one of them is much nicer than the other. That one would be the model we just bought, a 2013 Malibu Eco.

Despite seeming innovative in 2004 when it was launched, the Titan never really caught on with pickup truck buyers. The Titan brought a punchy and refined powertrain, large four-door cabin, relatively agile handling, a pre-sprayed bed, and a damped tailgate. But sales were lagging expectations and a host of reliability problems plagued it in the first few years.

Toyota's crystal ball must be running on all cylinders. (Or maybe it's a hybrid.) With rising gas prices and a still-lukewarm economy, the Prius C seems tailor-made for these times: Prius fuel economy without the Prius price tag.

It's hard for a car company to compete these days without a competent small SUV. For years, Mazda had been (barely) selling their Tribute, a design they developed with Ford that was also sold as the Escape. It went on sale back in 2000 and eventually faded from the market after a 10-year run. But now Mazda finally has the fully modern, all-new CX-5. And this time Mazda is keeping this car for themselves.

Our recent test of a Chrysler 300 sedan equipped with the 5.7-liter Hemi V8 left a favorable impression, as evidenced by the significant improvement in the big sedan's road test score. Like many recently updated products from Chrysler, the 300 got an extensive freshening for 2011 that included a much-improved interior and other updates, transforming it into a comfortable and refined large sedan.

There was a time when consumers could count on redesigned cars to be better than the previous model. Well, not any more, as exemplified by Honda's string of models that performed worse than their predecessors. Now it seems Toyota has followed suit, with its all-new Yaris being less competitive than before.

Picking up our new 2012 Audi TT Roadster on the first over-70 degree day this year in Connecticut is definitely not a bad way to spend an afternoon.

Back in 1998, when Volkswagen recast its iconic Beetle, it produced a caricature of the original--a car with modern technology, but having more style than substance that ended up appealing to drivers (mainly women) who put a premium on cuteness. A frequent question was whether the company could continue to keep such a design fresh.

With our new Fisker Karma back from its recent visit to the dealer, we were able to record a video to share our initial driving impressions of the car.

Last week, we experienced a failure with our $108,000 Fisker Karma plug-in hybrid that required the car to be transported back to the dealer with less than 200 miles on the odometer. It turns out that Consumer Reports isn't the only Karma owner to experience problems. (Read the original post: "Bad Karma: Our Fisker Karma plug-in hybrid breaks down.")

With the introduction of the iQ, Scion is offering fashion-conscious microcar buyers an alternative to the oh-so-three-years-ago Smart ForTwo.