Meinl BCA2NT/EBK-M Bongo Cajon

I was initially not impressed by this instrument - In the product videos/recordings you hear a clearly defined bongo sound with a subtle snare effect - on these the snare effect completely drowns out the bongo tones leaving only a very harsh snare sound especially on the deeper section. I don't know whether this is because of the way they mic'd or edited the video recording or whether there are big variations in tone between individual models. All was not lost though - I removed the snares and found a very nice pure bongo tone - better in my opinion than the tone produced by the similarly sized snareless bongo cajon (supernatural) - the wood seems to be slightly thinner on this model and it is thus easier to get nice tones without having to strike the surface too hard. So without the snares it is in fact a very nice sounding bongo cajon in it's own right. So I have given this product 4 stars because, out of the box it didn't sound very good, but with a small adjustment it has improved dramatically. In the meantime I have decided to carefully trim one third of the length off the snare wires using metal snips and plan to try these out tonight as this should reduce the amount of rattle from the snares - I will update this review tomorrow with the results... Update: Reducing the length of the snares didn't reduce the rattling enough - neither did reducing the number of individual wires - it was just passable on the high pitched side but I couldn't get rid of the overpowering rattle on the low side. So I am going to settle for a nice snareless cajon - would rather try one hands on before buying next time...