Sorry Bnrlaw -- I didn't think you were being serious with your question, but obviously I was wrong and I did come off like and "audiophile elitist." My bad. I'll try to attone.
I agree with Tim that speaker placement is of utmost importance in the sound you will get out of your system. Many people blow big bucks on new equipment for better sound when they would have gotten much better results optimizing speaker placement in their room -- and it's free.
Also, as Tim said, I'd highly recommend playing around with a wide variety of placements and you'll start to get a feel feel for what the trade-offs are. My experience with Joseph Audio speakers is that they do like room to breathe and sound considerably better away from room boundaries(i.e. wider/deeper soundstage, better balanced, more realistic imaging, etc.). Also, since the RM25s do go fairly low you may find that the bass gets a little boomy if put too close to walls or other objects. Because of this I would think leaving the space behind the speakers open will yield better results with a more "open" sound, so you might want to try it both ways to see what works for you. I'd also highly encourage you to try pulling the speakers out a good 4 to 5 feet from the cabinets just to see how the soundstage and transparency changes when the RM25s are more far removed from any boundaries. You may not want to leave them there and it may look ridiculous(except to another audiophile), but it should prove very instructive in gauging the trade-offs in speaker placement with your speakers in your room.
Sorry again for the sarcasm, and best of luck.
