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Originally Posted by ConchDiesel
1) Which car has a smoother, quieter ride?
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My vote goes towards the Prius, but nobody can really know until the new HCH is on the road.
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Originally Posted by ConchDiesel
2) Which car gets better gas mileage?
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This is hard to answer directly because so much of the mileage a person gets depends on the driving style and conditions. The Prius has more potential in it's stock form to get super mileage as was discovered recently with the 110 MPG marathon tank. The HCH is good, and potentially as good as any Prius in daily driving scenarios, but the Prius still gets my vote based on what I've seen in terms of it being driven without consideration for mileage: it seems to handle it a bit better (40's vs 30's).
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Originally Posted by ConchDiesel
3) Which car is more dependable ( I noticed some posts about the D light in the Civid Hybrid Forum)?
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There are some arguments about the Civic's alleged ability to continue to operate with a dead high voltage battery, making it the more durable option, but I don't really see a need to operate a vehicle in disrepair, especially if it costs less to maintain in the first place. The track record of the Prius is very good with some high mileage taxis being shipped back to Japan to be examined and found to be in excellent shape. There's a small sample of hybrid vehicles in the Canadian government fleet and they tracked all scheduled maintenance and other repairs, the Prius was cheaper in both categories than the Insights.
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Originally Posted by ConchDiesel
4) Which car is more technically advanced? The Toyota people say the Honda's use the old Prius engine technology from 2003 and before, is that true?
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The Toyota "people" aren't giving straight info, but their characterization may be correct in some ways. The Prius has been able to run using the electric motor only since it's release in Japan in 1997, the Civic is just getting it's ability to do this, but still won't be able to start off in electric-only mode, just low-speed steady-state cruising with the engine also spinning (but not firing). The Prius is more advanced, it pushes the envelope on the technology front. That may be a bit scary for some people, having looked behind the dash facing and seeing the thousands of wires makes me cringe at the thought of tracing a bad connection or something... but really all modern cars are equally complex, although probably not
as complex as a Prius. This also very much depends on your definition of 'advanced' because the Civic has many advanced features too.
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Originally Posted by ConchDiesel
5) I'm a little concerned about engine noise. The 2005 Hybrid Civic did not drive a quietly and was a little more sluggish than the 2005 Prius.
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From what I've read the new Civic is an improvement over the 2005 in terms of acceleration, but the Prius still has more lauch power, thanks to it's rather large electric motor. Sound dampening has yet to be really compared, but again improvement over the 2005 should be apparent.