First, a quick visual comparison between Cobra…

… and Viper.

Despite playing no louder—not because they couldn't but my ears can't—Cobra's extra cone surface made for a still beefier chunkier more gravitational sound. On true depth-mining movie soundtracks, it left absolutely nothing to the imagination in the very lowest bass. That's referencing tracks I know intimately from my dual 15" subwoofer equalized to be up 3dB at 20Hz. Now riddle us this. Which other 19" two-way could we listen to from 1 metre away next to a writing desk to hear stereo bass all the way into the abyss? Cue extended silence. Cobra's extra cone surface also made for higher dynamic crest factor. What took a hit was inter-image separation. The extra density in the lower-mid/upper-bass range created some congeal compared to Viper. As a conservatory-trained classical clarinet player, my sonic imprint is acoustic not amplified music. What I mostly listen to even today reflects it. Cobra's tuning reminded me of the tonal and textural balance I experienced at amplified live gigs around Lake Geneva. They were always bigger, bassier, darker, louder, thicker and more wall of sound than the unplugged variants. It's why on the desktop Viper plays more to my imprint. Though it already veers a bit into the amplified direction, it goes rather less far particularly because I tap one speaker at its 80Hz high pass to lean out the overall low end a bit. My personally biggest Cobra cracker—the secret hot-flash aka power-surge moment if you will—came from those tall air-motion transformers. Sitting at '3' so with the default padding resistor, they tracked deeply embedded cymbal trails, triangle fades, singing-bowl warbles and top-of-the-bridge violin flageolet of Russian gipsy fare with fantastic alacrity.

With Greg's own Vermillion interconnect and speaker cable.

Running this premium part as a regular not super tweeter like Viper does its smaller mate really drove my sonic scenery full-on cabriolet style so with the roof down and sun or starlight raining down. I spun up favourite treble tracks from harmonically lit-up piano recordings to ambient techno with electronically generated high clicks and blitzing noise zingers popping up all over like rapidly flashing mini spotlights. That tall dipole AMT with bona fide Mundorf pedigree is really special. I applaud Grzegorz for chucking puritanical widebander notions which would bring it in a good octave higher. Letting us hear its full bandwidth is quite the treat. Obviously my office wasn't remotely representational of how Cobra should be used. So it had to make quick onward tracks into the adjacent listening lounge. Passing thoughts? My desktop preferred Viper because its smaller point source generates more soundstage holography without Cobra's warmth boost that lays it on thicker and to quasi compensate then must play louder. I don't want nearfield overload. That said, I'd love to repatriate those tall AMT. Of course Viper's crossover wouldn't exploit them properly. That isn't feasible. Confessing the desire simply made a point.