Flooring Accoustics

tommyt21

How much of a diffrence does carpet, tile or wood floor make to the overall sound quality?

Gadabout

I bought a new house about 3 years ago and I was asking the same question. The folks that I bought the house from were nice enough to let me set up my HT mains, center and sub in one of the models that was the same floor plan as mine.

Their model had wood floors, and thats what I was considering installing in mine. The model was also fully furnished, drapes and everything. The wood floors seemed to make the sound bounce around a bit. It seemed to make the sound stage a bit blurred. Was this my imagination or was it real? I'm not sure.

Anyway, I went with Carpet in the great room, not because I preferred it but mainly for the acoustics. That being said I found that I didn't care for the sub response on carpet and now it's sitting on 16 x 16 piece of tile. I'm sure if I was married, acoustics wouldn't have been factored into the decision of wood floors vs. carpet.

Scott

Polkie2009

Gadabout, I see you're running a downfiring sub, so having a harder surface under it is beneficial:) I have to ask Tommy, this is on the bottom floor with a concrete slab?

stuwee

There's a reason musicians have big, cheap throw rugs on stage in front of their monitors, it usually makes a more balanced sound. My entire home is saltillo tile, very bright. A big, cheap throw rug in front of the ML's works great for me, way better bass responce, and it evens out the 'coming from everywhere' mids and highs from the 'stats.

I might get a better sound with some wall treatments, but I'm happy with the sound now, so why muck with it? BTW, I have a pine plank ceiling, which only adds to the great warm tone I like

tommyt21

Polkie2009 wrote: »

Gadabout, I see you're running a downfiring sub, so having a harder surface under it is beneficial:) I have to ask Tommy, this is on the bottom floor with a concrete slab?

Yes, bottom living room floor is currently carpeted on a concrete slab. We are looking redoing the floor.

Gadabout

Polkie2009 wrote: »

Gadabout, I see you're running a downfiring sub, so having a harder surface under it is beneficial:) I have to ask Tommy, this is on the bottom floor with a concrete slab?

Yes, I'm running the DSW 500 pro. Placing the tile under the sub seemed to crisp things up a bit, not quite as subdued as it sounded on carpet alone. The carpet in the house is a pretty low pile, with a good 3/4 in pad, on a concrete slab.

The other reason I decided to with carpet was the houses on my block are pretty close together. Only 10ft separate houses on either side. Since I'm a night owl, I didn't want to have unhappy neighbors at 2am in the morning cause I'm watching an action movie with the volume up.

Bottom line, whatever you decide to go with. There are ways to compensate for it. As mentioned above a nice thick area rug, wall treatments, even thicker draperies or adding a piece of tile under the sub as I did.

Scott

Polkie2009

Excellent points Stuwee, the rugs work great to tame those hard floors. +1 on the pine plank ceiling:) Is it any coincidence you see different kinds of wood used in recording studios? Tommy, since you're running a HT setup and have the sidefiring sub, maybe carpeting is best. I do notice a lot of folks with 2 channel setups like the hardwood floors equipped of course with the larger throw rug and acoustic treatments etc...

kevhed72

Every room is different....I went from carpeting and drywall ceiling to hardwood laminate and drop ceiling. I actually prefer the later...

gdb

stuwee wrote: »

There's a reason musicians have big, cheap throw rugs on stage in front of their monitors, it usually makes a more balanced sound. My entire home is saltillo tile, very bright. A big, cheap throw rug in front of the ML's works great for me, way better bass responce, and it evens out the 'coming from everywhere' mids and highs from the 'stats.

I might get a better sound with some wall treatments, but I'm happy with the sound now, so why muck with it? BTW, I have a pine plank ceiling, which only adds to the great warm tone I like

Just hang a couple of kachina & Kokopelli dolls for your wall treatments.

VR3

But me down for hard wood floor + rug camp

Hate carpet on every level, acoustics dont even matter...

If you dont hate carpet you obviously have never ripped some of it up after 10 years to see what is under it

stuwee

gdb wrote: »

Just hang a couple of kachina & Kokopelli dolls for your wall treatments.

I do have the Bali Goddess Cumon Iwannalayu guarding the ML alcove, note Rockin' Rod and Gayle Sanders on the back wall for back up :biggrin:

gdb

That's not very Tucson of you...... but very cool nonetheless!:cool: