Rendezvous seats five passengers, or seven with the optional third-row seats. Its seats are roomy and comfortable and the interior is elegantly designed. The controls feature big knobs and are easy to operate.

The new Rendezvous Ultra is luxurious with elegant leather and wood trim. It's roomier and can carry more cargo than a Lexus RX 330, the archetype of luxury crossovers. Though not as quiet as a luxury sedan, the Rendezvous rides better than most SUVs. All-wheel drive is available, improving traction and handling in slippery conditions.

New for 2005 is a passenger-sensing system for the right front seat, which turns off the corresponding airbag if it detects a small-size occupant, or no occupant at all, thereby avoiding possibly injuries to a child or small adult and/or an unnecessary replacement of the airbag. A status indicator on the instrument panel tells occupants if the airbag is on or off. Even with this feature, however, the second or third row is the safest seating position for a child.

LaCrosse is not an all-new car by any means. It's built in Canada on GM's W-car intermediate platform, one of the oldest in the GM chassis inventory. But about 80 percent of the parts and systems underneath are new, along with new interior and exterior designs.

The LaCrosse has a rich, high-quality looking interior with attractive woodgrain trim, nicely presented instruments and controls and available leather seats with nice-looking gathered stitching. Buick's Quiet Tuning has made the new LaCrosse one of the quietest, most pleasant cars to ride and drive in among the entire class.

The LaCrosse rides smoothly and quietly, but its steering is much more precise than previous models and it turns into corners crisply with little body lean. The V6 engines offer good power, growling under acceleration, but smooth and quiet when motoring along, and the transmissions work flawlessly.

What owners of recent Buicks might not expect is the way LaCrosse drives. Its steering is more precise, and it turns into corners crisply, with little body lean. In short, it handles quite impressively on winding mountain roads where it's capable of keeping up with any of the imported mid-size cars. Its V6 engines offer good power, growling under acceleration, but motoring along smoothly and quietly on the freeway. And of course its transmission works flawlessly.

Electronic features make the well-equipped LaCrosse a safe, all-weather family car with nice conveniences. Among them: a remote starting system that will work from up to 500 feet away, great on cold winter mornings; OnStar, which will dispatch emergency crews to your precise location if you have a wreck and don't respond to operators' calls; XM Satellite Radio to pick up Fox News, CNN, ESPN, or your favorite music; and StabiliTrak, which can help keep you from skidding off a slippery road. ABS and side-curtain airbags come standard.

For 2007, Buick LaCrosse benefits from revised trim and equipment upgrades, including a standard tire-pressure monitor and available Turn-by-Turn navigation from OnStar. Otherwise, it's largely unchanged from 2006.

The Lucerne CXS is certainly the most enjoyable of the new Buicks to drive, thanks to its powerful V8 engine and Magnetic Ride Control, an adaptive sports suspension developed for the Corvette. Yet we might opt for the Lucerne CXL V6, a very enjoyable car to drive, with agile handling and plenty of performance. The V6-powered Lucerne CXL is positioned to compete against the Toyota Avalon and Lexus ES 330, while the V8-powered CXS aspires to the Lexus GS and Infiniti M luxury sedans.

As it has done from time to time throughout its 103-year history, Buick is rethinking, renewing, revising and rationalizing its model lineup. The Buick Lucerne replaced the Park Avenue and LeSabre when launched as a 2006 model. The Lucerne benefits greatly from the structure and chassis hardware that it shares with the recently launched Cadillac DTS. In this, Lucerne is not breaking tradition but confirming it. The biggest Buicks have shared body structure with Cadillacs since the 1930s, if not before; and they have shared significant chassis pieces since 1965.