my wife would say that my '02 ES300 has had the jerk in it from the
beginning too...  ;-)

I purchased an ES330 in April and have 7K+ miles on it, with almost an equal
number of miles in the city and on the highway.

I thoroughly researched the 330 and was aware of the reported issues with
the "drive-by wire" before I purchased mine. In response to your post, my
car does occasionally exhibit the very slight hesitation and accompanying
jerk when the transmission responds. Being aware of it beforehand migated
the problem as far as I am concerned. It is a small talley on the negative
side of the ledger, with the upside more than overcoming this small minor
annoyance.

The 330 is buttery smooth to drive, both in the city and on the highway, as
well. To me, it is the perfect size and has the perfect blend of sportiness,
power, luxury, quality engineering and assembly, value retention and low
cost of ownership. I have owned a volvo, mercury grand marquis', two camrys,
a celica, honda del sol, toyota echo, fords, chevys, pontiac, volkswagon and
several others, and the 330 is by far (so far) the best.

It helped that a family member is employed with Toyota MM and I was able to
purchase under their employee purchase plan. I got over 5K off sticker and
bumper to bumper for 100K miles. I hope to have 5 or 6 worry-free years of
driving.

Oh, BTW, a different thread implied that Toyota obtained their component
parts from the same suppliers as "American" vehicles. While this is very
true, one thing that fails to be pointed out, is that Toyota's
specifications are much more demanding than Toyota or Honda. My son works
for a company that supplies several parts for automobile assembly plants and
he has commented several times to me that the Japanese are serious about
ZERO defects.

Meanwhile, I'll keep an eye out for the service bulletin that will correct
the hesitation issue, seemingly inherent in the drive-by wire technology.