Room acoustic design must begin with speaker placement decisions

Evidence

Before we examine specific room designs, let us first examine the optimum speaker layouts for both stereo and 5.1 surround systems. The reason for doing this is that most modern room designs for critical listening need to know where the speakers will be in order to be designed. It is also pretty pointless to have a wonderful room if the speakers are not in an optimum arrangement. — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 2260