I rented a HCH just to see what it was like for a day or two; I'll probably do the same thing for the Prius as well. (The car rental place had multiple 2nd-generation Priuses along with at least one HCH.) Here's my mini-review of the HCH after spending a bit over a day with it...

Mileage sucks. The way I drive, I mean. I drive the car like a car to enjoy driving with, and that means driving 80+ mph on the highway and never using cruise control. I found I got 22-23 mpg on the highway, which is terrible. My VW Jetta gets 26mpg at 90mph. The HCH's mileage didn't appear to vary between 80 and 90 mph, but it was consistently significantly lower than my Jetta's. Oh, these tests were conducted with A/C on since it was too hot not to have it on, and I tested a route with Econ mode off and the same route with it on, and there was no FE difference.

On my drive to work, which is mostly highway but a bit of "city" driving as well, I got a bit over 26mpg. Still bad. The Prius gets much better mileage, as far as I could tell from dealer test drives. I'll have to rent it to really evaluate it in comparison.

Performance is surprisingly adequate, in my opinion. The low-speed performance is excellent, but it takes a long time to accelerate at highway speeds (70+). On even gentle hills, I found I couldn't accelerate at all... though maybe that was only with Econ on, I forget. Still, it's nothing I couldn't get used to.

The steering is excellent at low speeds but uncomfortable at highway speeds. At low speeds, the minimum turning radius is really low compared to my other car, which helps not only when parking but just when turning from one street to another (rights and lefts). I found it made it much more pleasant. But at highway speeds I have to steer the wheel much further to turn than I'm used to on my responsive Jetta. It also seemed very slippery (something people complain about with the Jetta) but this may have been due to the tires. It did feel like I'd careen off the highway when turning on it.

The view is very good as well, and this is very important to me. The Prius has a highly restrictive view and even the 2006 HCH looks to as well, but the current HCH has a pretty wide-open front windshield and side windows that are easy to see out. When you look to the right side of the car, if nobody else is in it, you get a great view at whatever's on your right. It sounds odd but alot of cars (like my Jetta to a slight extent) don't quite give you as good a view, which matters when lane-changing. It could be due to the fact that the HCH is a very low car. Length is normal, but it's just very low.

As for electronics, they're pretty good as well. The speakers are obviously not very good but they're basically adequate. If I did buy the car, I would seek an after-market replacement. Everything else was very good. At first I disliked the FE indicator, but it's not hard to get used to, and everything is right in front of you on the dashboard; no center LCD screen to divert your attention to. And fan, A/C, and radio controls are all perfectly normal and analog, which is an advantage over the Prius. You shoudn't have to navigate menus and submenus to access basic commands.

In conclusion, the car is pointless considering its horrible FE in the driving conditions I enjoy. My own 115hp VW Jetta (EPA: 22/28) gets much better mileage. But since I seem to recall the 110hp Prius performing much better than either, I hope I can attribute this just to the HCH's weak 93hp engine. Maybe the 2006's 115hp engine won't struggle so much to keep up and will ease up on the gas consumption as a result.