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"  In a recent meeting with the R&amp;amp;amp;T editorial staff, an official was uncharacteristically blunt in his assessment of the cushy, outgoing previous-generation sedan: &amp;quot;That thing was such a couchmobile,&amp;quot; he admitted. &amp;quot;Yes, we tried the luxo approach, but, frankly, that just wasn&amp;#039;t us.&amp;quot;   Not unexpectedly, what followed was an explanation of how the all-new would be a dramatically different car, a luxury sports sedan aimed at a younger, more affluent buyer, a technology-packed all-wheel-driver that&amp;#039;s truer to Acura&amp;#039;s sporty roots.   So, has Acura built such a car?   Indeed it has, but the new RL isn&amp;#039;t quite what we had expected. Many of us had hoped for a big rear-driver to compete with the and Q45. Instead, Acura opted to build a reasonably compact RL that&amp;#039;s 3.0 in. shorter than the previous RL (with a 4.4-in. decrease in wheelbase), and equip it with a V-6 rather than a V-8.   Why the V-6? Premium unleaded at $2.63 a gallon is a pretty persuasive argument. So, too, is the reality that most automobiles in the sub-$50,000 luxury performance sedan segment \u2014 cars such as the and \u2014 are sold with 6-cylinder engines. Furthermore, the RL&amp;#039;s transverse-mounted aluminum-block 3.5-liter VTEC V-6 is stout, smoothly generating 300 bhp, which is more than some V-8s, more than even its NSX sibling. That stated, the RL&amp;#039;s 60-degree sohc 24-valve V-6 still doesn&amp;#039;t have the invigorating pull of the slightly smaller but mighty 270-bhp Acura TL, which tips the scales some 500 lb. less than the new RL. In the RL&amp;#039;s defense, though, is a 6.7-second sprint to 60 mph that&amp;#039;s a half-second quicker than either aforementioned or .   Perhaps because the RL lacks the cachet of a V-8 (which some might deem a necessity in a car costing nearly $50,000), this Acura is sold only one way: loaded, with no options other than dealer-installed 18-in. wheels. As such, it&amp;#039;s brimming with neat new technologies \u2014 a very handy real-time traffic display for what is likely today&amp;#039;s most user-friendly, voice-activated satellite navigation system; a superb multiple-format (CD, DVD-A, XM radio, MP3) 10-speaker surround-sound stereo; and, most important, a unique all-wheel-drive system that improves cornering behavior by reducing the front-heavy RL&amp;#039;s tendency to understeer.   The complex but technically fascinating system (that borrows a page from the Prelude Type SH of 1997 and goes by the very Japanese-sounding &amp;quot;Super Handling all-wheel-drive&amp;quot; moniker) delivers optimal torque not simply between the front and rear wheels, but also between the left and right rear wheels. With SH-AWD \u2014 which is linked to the RL&amp;#039;s standard VSA system and uses its yaw, lateral-g, wheel speed and steering-angle sensors \u2014 as much as 70 percent of the RL&amp;#039;s drive torque can be sent rearward, where a pair of direct electromagnetic clutches on both sides of the differential can apportion as much as 100 percent of that power to either rear wheel. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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