I went out last weekend, two nights in near constant rain and overall I'm happy with it. The silpoly performed as hoped, no sag, no water absorption and completely different than silnylon. Packing up wet, I simply shook it and put it in a plastic bag to keep my other gear dry. It was wet, but wasn't the wet, heavy sloppy mess nylon would have been. That alone is worth the purchase.
We got a ton of rain and zero problems with anything. The nest has taped seams, so no sealing drama. I didn't have to re-tension any of the guyouts or touch it at all due to sagging like with nylon tents. Very nice.
The main zipper is pretty good. I got snagged a few times which I think is unavoidable with a flap, but much better than others like Big Agnes.
Venting was good, I pitched low due to temps and rain and had very minimal condensation, almost none. No water got in the vent or through the stove jack opening. My bag and gear didn't touch condensation as the nest is well designed to provide the double wall protection. I did wipe the doors before getting out just to see how much condensation there was, but it wasn't necessary.
The area between the nest and fly is big enough to store boots, maybe a pack in good weather, but I wouldn't put it there if raining.
Now the cons:
1. The nest doesn't have a peg loop where the three zippers come together. This is a big miss in my opinion as you can't open the nest with one hand unless you step on the bottom with your boot to hold it. If you don't, pulling on the zipper simply pulls the nest up. I will sew one in.
2. The doors attach to the stake with a cord loop which is tied too small to use any stake other than those provided. This is a big miss as well. The way it is, every time you want to get in the tent you have to wrestle the loop over the stake even using the factory stakes. Factory stakes (and most aftermarket) have notches at the top to keep the loop from coming off. It also keeps the door loop from coming off every time you try to get in or out.
Getting out of the tent isn't fun as you have to reach under and try to wrestle it out. If you only get out in the morning and get in at night it's fine, but if you get in and out frequently you will not like it.
One way to make it work is leave one side disconnected all the time, but that means all the stress is now on the zipper which I think might be a problem during windy conditions. The loops on all stake points suffer as well, I'll retie them all or add cord so I can easily use Groundhog or other stakes.
I'll convert to z-packs style.
https://zpacks.com/products/double-hook-apparatus-13. The nest only has one zipper. I knew this going in, but would have gladly carried the few ounces and paid another $10 to have two zippers. Even if you didn't need it for egress, it would have allowed you to easily access the mini vestibule and store one guy's boots and whatever on each side.
You only have easy access to one of the four "vestibule" areas. You can stuff things under the other three sides but you need to do it from the outside which wouldn't work for boots. Since it's staked down, only two of the four areas are practical to use, the other two could only fit small items under the fly without unstaking it.
4. The provided stakes suck. I sunk them all the way in and three pulled out the first time I pitched it in "real world" conditions. I'll be replacing them with MSR Groundhogs. (On a related note, the Amazon Grounghog Chinese knockoffs suck as well, bent the first one the first time I used it, shown in pic below).
5. The zipper flap velcro is pretty obnoxious when trying to open it all up with one hand. I wonder if it's really necessary.
6. The main door tie backs are bad for both the fly and nest. This problem has been long solved with velcro or an elastic loop that is quick and easy. Argali chose static line and a cord lock that is not fun on a good day and very frustrating with cold hands. I don't use them often and will use it even less often the way they did it.
7. The nest attaches to the fly with mini carabiners. These are very secure, but are hard to operate with cold hands and impossible with gloves. A simple hook might work, maybe it comes off during assembly and the carabiner is needed.
8. The nest doesn't have gear loops at the top. If they were important enough to include in the fly, why wouldn't they be important to include in the nest? If you pitch with trekking poles as I did, you can hook a light to the poles, but if you use the carbon pole or tie the top to a tree and go pole-less, you're out of luck.
9. Finally, the stuff sacks could be bigger to allow easier stuffing as well as allow them to conform better to voids in your pack. They are above average, stuffing is no problem, but I'm picky. Honestly, I don't use stuff sacks except for storage so this is an extremely minor critique. Others have noted that if you want to leave the nest and fly attached, you can't use a stuff sack as it won't fit into either of the two sacks.
Overall, no show stoppers. Although I had 9 points above, the only two I care much about are the first two and I can easily fix. The other ones seem to be things that in my opinion should have been worked into the design. I'm one guy with opinions and experience with probably 30 tents, so they may not be important to others.
I have yet to own or use a tent I didn't find problems with, this one has far fewer than any others. Overall I would give it an A-, easily upgraded to a solid A. Some of the issues are personal preference, but things like opening the door are clear problems that should have been discovered during field testing and easily addressed.
I'll get much more use this year, so things like durability, pitching in different conditions and withstanding wind will be tested.
Pic is after 2 days of rain, nice & tight. Some may recognize the camping area. The bent stake is the Chinese Groundhog knockoff, NOT the Argali provided stakes which haven't bent but did pull out fairly easily in soft forest soil.
