Big Agnes Rattlesnake SL2 mtnGLO

Lightweight, livable, and sturdy 3-season tent that sets up in seconds. Oh, and it has lights built into the ceiling.

This tent is lightweight but still packs a ton of features. The hubbed pole design clicks together and clips into the tent in moments. Usable stake loops make securing the tent easy. Two doors and two vestibules for easy in-and-out, and the simple but handy door-stash loops are the easiest way to stash a door I've encountered yet.

The mostly mesh tent keeps things dry and breezy, and the privacy panels block wind and eyes. There are two good sized pockets in each corner of the head end of the tent, a couple feet off of the floor. They also incorporate headphone/earbud routing slots, so you can listen to tunes while you doze off, or if the sound of rain pouring on the fly is enough to drive you crazy you can lay in your tent and distract yourself with music or podcasts or whatever your thing is. There are also loops for a gear loft, not included.

The fly is full coverage with decent sized vestibules, and a functional vent at the peak helps keep condensation under control. But, what sets this tent (and it's MtnGlo brethren) apart are the sewn-in LED light strands in the ceiling. Yeah, you can buy battery operated Xmas lights for your tent and campsite, and I have done just that, but those are a bother to hang, they get tangled up, and they inevitably break or die some other grisly death (spilling Ben's 100% DEET bug dope on a set of cheap dollar store lights? Like Gollum falling into the lava pits in Mordor. Or something like that.)

No, these lights are sewn into the ceiling seams, so they don't need to be hung after every tent setup, they don't get tangled, and they seem like they will last forever. There is a small pocket at the apex of the tent that holds the power supply (2 AAA batteries) that is a simple USB connection. There is an on/off slider switch that prevents the power button from accidentally being pressed in your pack, and after that is flipped to 'On', a simple press of a button gives you High, Low, and Off settings.

The light isn't super bright, but you can read a map, change clothes, and get your sleep system situated without using a headlamp. When it's time to snooze, reach up, push the button, and it's lights out. You can also use any USB power source to give juice to your tent, like those small battery packs that charge your phone, but unless it has a dedicated on/off button, you'll have to unplug it to turn off the lights, and fumble for it in the dark if you wake up in the middle of the night and need to answer the call of nature, as they say.

The supplied power pack is small and light, so there shouldn't be any reason to ditch it for something else, and so far I have used this tent for 10 days without losing any battery power, granted the lights are on for just a few minutes each night. And I'm sure the batteries I put in the pack were not 100% full, so a couple AAA batteries should last quite a while, but I still carry spares, as my headlamp and this tent both use the same size battery.

The only cons I have encountered so far are the tightness of the floor plan—two 20-inch Nemo sleeping pads fit inside perfectly, with 6-8 inches of space between the pads and the head of the tent, enough room to stash a book or jacket.

But, I was looking for a tent that was light and could fit into tight campsites, so I knew what I was getting into when I purchased the tent, but others should know that this is a lean and mean backpacking tent, not exactly ultralight but light enough, and it is freestanding, as opposed to those uberlight tents that you have to adjust and fiddle with and then tension the fly again and adjust the trekking pole support...I know, because I own those type of shelters too.

But for no-brainer tent setup, usability, convenience, stargazing, distance-hiking and lights built into the tent, the Rattlesnake 2 SL MtnGlo fits the criteria I needed, and maybe it will work for you too.

Excellent tent but...

** I do not want to write a standard copy/paste review of what everybody does out there. There are tons of similar reviews and you can check basic stuff there. I will point out the main points I discovered.**

Overall this is an excellent tent with great setup, stability, packability, features etc.

Where I was a little bit disappointed:

• It seems to be a little bit small for 2 persons. As one person using the tent, I found it had huge room for me and my gear, but I personally am not sure if 2 persons will fit easily. Good thing is that it has two roomy vestibules on each side.
• It is light, but not ultralight. If we look at it for one person usage, it is not even in "light" category, for two persons it is good but overall I expected more in this price range. I have upgraded standard aluminum stakes with ultralight MSR stakes. In total now it is 1.94Kg without a footprint, so a little bit more than claimed.
• Tent has some kind of design flaw which is noticeable in rain. Angle and distance of rain fly and internal mesh is so, that when you try to open external door, if you will not do it very carefully raindrops will fall inside. 

I was a little bit skeptical about usefulness of integrated lights. I thought it was unnecessary extra weight, but I was wrong, it is really great feature. It uses three AAA batteries and consumes very very less and you can use those batteries as a spare for you headlamp for example (you should carry spare batteries anyway, right?).

I would recommend getting the footprint because the bottom seems to be fragile and can be punctured easily (actually same is true for all today's tents).

All in all I'm quite happy with my purchase and would recommend it to anyone.