And the almost-last shall be first: Porsche jumped from thirty-second to first place, in the annual J.D. Power & Associates Initial Quality Study (IQS). This is the 20th iteration of the study, which measures problems in the first 90 days of car ownership. This year, it also measures new-owner concerns with practical design touches—not whether the car looks good, but whether the cupholders are in the right place and whether the CD changer is hard to reach.

Unfortunately, some cars with mega-doses of new technology didn't fare so well. Most notably, although BMW was close to the best in a less-published breakout covering physical defects per 100 cars built, the poster child for cockpit controllers gone awry plummeted from third to thirty-second, because of apparent concerns with cockpit controls. Some automakers whose cars we named to the recent Digital Drive Award top ten, finished in these slots: 4 (Toyota), 6 (Honda), 7 (Cadillac), 10 (Acura), 18 (Audi), 20 (Pontiac), 25 (Mercedes-Benz), and 28 (BMW). Lexus also is tech-heavy, though, and it finished second this year, after a string of first-place finishes.

Initial quality scores, as measured by J.D. Power, covered problems per 100 cars in the first 90 days of ownership. Cars have improved markedly on that measure, with an average of 124 problems per 100 cars reported; five years ago the average was 147 per 100. Though Power does dozens of surveys each year, for U.S. car-buying customers, the big three are the IQS; the Customer Satisfaction Index, which has evolved from reliability after one year to general satisfaction with the car and the buying processing; and the Vehicle Dependability Index, which measures problems after three years of ownership.

The top five brands this year were Porsche (fifth from the bottom in 2005), Lexus, Hyundai (the first time a Korean automaker was the best non-luxury brand), Toyota, and Jaguar. Last year, the top five were Lexus, Jaguar, BMW, Buick, and Cadillac. Porsche owners reported 91 defects per 100 owners. Last-place finisher Land Rover suffered 204 problems per 100 vehicles. The biggest drops were suffered by BMW (from 3 to 27), Buick (4 to 22), Mercedes-Benz (5 to 25), and Hummer (10 to 34). That's likely a reflection of changed methodology rather than a failure to screw all the pieces into place at the factories. But Power notes that most of these vendors had new-model introductions that are prone to more problems replacing reliable older models.

Among individual models, either Toyota or Lexus placed first in 11 of 19 categories. Top vehicles in the other eight segments are from Kia, Mazda, Porsche, Pontiac, Hyundai, Chevrolet, Ford, and Chrysler.

Check out Bill Howard's expert take on Why Tech Cars Faltered.