If you could...

I wouldn't recommend a rectangle at all. Although that's what is mostly written up--it's done so because acoustic calculations for standing waves are pretty simple, and most rooms are rectangular. If I were building a dedicated listening room there would be no parallel walls or floor to ceiling height.

Robert Harley's book "The Complete Guide To High-End Audio" recommends a formula with the hight being 1 the length of 1.9 and width of 1.7. If I were designing a room I would splay the walls maybe 2' smaller on the wall behind the speakers than the wall behind me. I have thought a big bow wall behind the listening possition as an effective and look cool. For sure the ceiling would slope, even if only a little was possible. I would look at areas for built in base traps. My new Audiogon friend "nicetom" recommended Everest's book "Sound Studio Construction on a Budget" as an excellant reference. I have seen other Everest books talked about here, that might be the best place to start. Good luck and have fun! J.D.

Ziff, I would also recommend Everest Book "The Master Handbook of Acoustics". As far as splaying walls go I think Everest does a Finite Element Analysis on a room with splayed walls in the book. If you are absolutely sure you want to splay the walls do yourself a favor and check local building codes first. In my area the local building codes say the walls must be straight to within a 1/4" over a given linear distance, but I am not sure how this applies to wall coverings like sheetrock. Cheers, Dan

The absolute best system I ever heard was installed in a large, circular room with a heavy domed ceiling, baffles around the walls, and a moderately thick carpet. Not a standing wave in the place, and excellent sound quality from almost anywhere in the room.

Wouldn't that be great! A dome circular room, and only about $500/ sq. ft. Great thought Sd