"The room can totally wreck, or make, a system"

Best $500 dollars that I ever spent was DIYing a case of 703 Owen’s-Corning rigid fiberglass panels. 

Hear hear. I did that right away for my 6.5 foot ceiling. Made the room usable.

I would add this. “A person’s hearing ability can totally wreck or make their audio system “. My gut feeling tells me that many audiophiles having hearing deficiencies but don’t correct them. 

My gut feeling is that an audiophile that doesn't correct their room, barring a spouse that defies them, has a brain deficiency not a hearing deficiency. Or, they are audiophiles that don't seek the best sound — an oxymoron. Even folks with hearing problems can hear a huge percentage of what is there. Hans B. has covered this.

I upgraded my AVR and it came with Addyssey room equalization software. It was a hallelujah moment.

I've encountered too many purists who won't go for room correction. I use it for my subs and it solved the issue. I'd rather have good sound with room correction than do nothing! (And there's some good room correction gear out there, such as Lyngdorf.)

So many people are let down after laying out big bucks for what they thought was the speaker of their dreams once the honeymoon period of new ownership fades and the true critical listening begins…

It certainly is good for reviewers who can say "Best speaker ever" to people who really just have a room problem but want to buy their way out of their problem.

I sang this song here for many years. :)

The sound quality result not from the room or the systems but from the relation between specifics ears/brain, specifics system parts and speakers, specifics room (including the material acoustic content of the room and his geometry,size and topology). it result from vibrations controls and from Electrical noise floor control...

The rest is useless upgrade when we reach an optimal purchase point for our budget.

The worst part about a bad room is how it will constantly send an audiophile into a consumer merry-go-round.  Constantly trying to improve the sound with better speakers/cables/etc.

Too bad all speakers aren't as easy as Ohm. You tell them the room volume and they give you the appropriate speaker.

I'd rather start with room friendly speakers. From what I hear, 1st order like Thiel are the worst. Even my B & W with steep x-over got bad room reflections when volume was turned up. Sound became confused and muddled.

As you all of stated, room treatment is critical. Probably the most important part of your system. You can do more harm than good however, if you don't know what you are doing, or just put some things in the room, thinking it will make an improvement. I had treated my room in a manner that I thought made sense, treating obvious reflection points, etc. However, the cheap products I used were far too thin to trap anything but high frequency and I didn't have near enough bass absorption. I also had too much absorption and not enough diffusion in spots. 

I re-did things with professional advice from GIK and their free consulting/room design service. It is an excellent service and free of charge, but of course they hope you will end up using their products. I did, and the results were 100% better. GIK is excellent and there are many other great products on the market. Spend the money and do it the RIGHT way.