The Power Wagon positively churns through hostile terrain, the HEMI singing a song of unembarrassed horsepower, yet the steering remains responsive even with all three differentials locked up.

We drove the 2004 Suzuki XL-7 back-to-back with several competitors—the Ford Escape, Saturn VUE, Toyota RAV4 and others—and honestly didn’t expect much.  The XL-7 has been around a while, after all, and cars in hotly contested segments like the compact SUV class tend to age about as gracefully as ill-bred racehorses.

We’re happy to report that the XL-7 surprised us.  With a new face and mechanical refinements for 2004, this dark horse proved to be a very strong runner indeed.
Suzuki’s redesign is handsome.  The XL-7’s familiar two-box features get a bolder …

If you’ve got the urge to put down the $32,090 for your own Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon, just remember this: don’t keep it on the pavement.

Prices down, ability up? That’s the kind of deal truck guys like to hear about.

With a string of recent home-run vehicle introductions behind it, Nissan is about to attempt its toughest launch yet.  The 2004 Titan hits dealers this December, taking Nissan into full-size pickup truck territory.  How new is Nissan to the last Big-Three dominated market?  As the Titan was being shown to journalists for the first time, Nissan dealers across the country were scrambling to equip their service departments with vehicle lifts strong enough to hoist the big pickup trucks for oil changes.

Rather than trying to compete with the comprehensive, two-hundred model …

With the number of Chevrolet TrailBlazer/GMC Envoy variants out there—seven at last count, not counting powertrain options–you’d be forgiven for stifling a yawn when we tell you there’s another one.  But pay attention; those big chrome hockey sticks on the D-pillar of this SUV mean that this is a very special Envoy indeed.

The 2004 Envoy XUV is a sport-ute with a retractable rear roof section for carrying pickup truck-sized loads.  It’s not fair to call it the first vehicle of its kind; Studebaker got there first with its Wagonaire in …

Amid the recent fanfare of new trucks from Ford and Nissan, it’s been easy to overlook another all-new player coming into the segment; the 2004 Toyota Tundra Double Cab.  It may look like the familiar old Tundra, but significant improvements under the skin set the new Toyota apart.

It’s no secret that the Tundra has been regarded as the “small” full-size pickup.  With the competition getting tougher and bigger every year, it was time to field a response to the Tundra’s detractors.  To this end, the new crew-cab version isn’t just …

You’d be forgiven for mistaking the 2004 GMC Canyon for its larger brother the Sierra. The all-new compact pickup borrows the familiar styling of GMC’s full-size trucks. It borrows the “premium pickup” mission in life as well. The Canyon, which replaces the Sonoma in the lineup, features a more powerful engine team, a larger interior, and some features you might not expect in a relatively inexpensive truck.

Like the Chevrolet Colorado, which it’s built alongside, the Canyon is new from the ground up.  In the past, the GMC Sonoma played second …

The most impressive thing about the Ford Ranger is how well it measures up to its much newer competitors.  Even next to Chevrolet’s all-new Colorado, the Ranger (whose last significant redesign was over a decade ago) still feels current.  Its sixteen-year reign as best-selling compact pickup truck thus comes as no surprise.

In the face of new competitors, Ford is sticking to the formula that works.  For 2004 the Ranger gets a minor facelift and a new round of refinements to keep it in the game.  Upgrades to the Ranger’s interior …

Back in the 1960s, the initials “KR” meant King of the Road, as in Carroll Shelby’s high-powered Mustang GT500KR.  These days, there’s another KR roaming the freeways, but this one’s a truck, and “KR” means “King Ranch.”

Ford’s King Ranch edition, introduced on its full-size pickups in 2001, is a marketing package produced with the help of Texas’ King Ranch.  This giant ranch takes up a space approximately the size of Rhode Island in south Texas, and has been a fixture in the ranching industry for many years.  The decision to …