I have been using this drum for little over a month now and so far I am incredibly happy with it! When the snares are turned off it produces a wonderful, bright timbale sound and when in snare mode it produces a very tight and crisp sound, almost like a marching snare or drum corps kind of sound.
The drum is very well made and it hasn't moved at all since i set it up on my kit. The quality of the stock head also surprised me as it is easy to tune and hasn't de-tuned with time. There is also a Meinl tuning spanner included so tuning the drum is easy.
One drawback I have found while using this drum is that the lever to turn the snare wires on or off can be somewhat stiff and awkward to use and I often find myself having to use two hands to turn the snares off.
I own both this model and the ten inch version and I would say that if you can only purchase one of these snare timbales then I personally would choose the ten inch model. This is not necessarily because it sounds better than this eight inch model, but because its larger size means it has a much more versatile tuning range and is a little louder.
Overall I personally love both of these drums and they work brilliantly together whether they are both in snare mode, both in timbale mode or in some other configuration. You truly get a wide variety of sounds from these quality instruments from Meinl!