concrete floors

[Kasey]

i record in an unfinished room, with cut out carpet lying on the floor on top of concrete. i know that for live sounding rooms, hard wood floors are best. Would concrete have the same effect? should i take out the carpeting? i dont mind the aesthetics of anything, as long as it sounds good.

 

[HapiCmpur]

i record in an unfinished room, with cut out carpet lying on the floor on top of concrete. i know that for live sounding rooms, hard wood floors are best. Would concrete have the same effect? should i take out the carpeting? i dont mind the aesthetics of anything, as long as it sounds good.

Yes, you should lose the carpeting IF you can put sound absorption of some kind on the ceiling. The concrete will work just fine as long as you don't mind the aesthetics.

However, if you can't put absorption on the ceiling, then you're probably better off leaving the carpet where it is -- or replacing it with something else that will absorb some sound. If you don't, you'll get hellacious slap echo between the floor and the ceiling.

If you haven't seen this already, please read it and pay especially close attention to the side bar titled "Hard floor, soft ceiling." http://www.ethanwiner.com/acoustics.html

 

[jonnyc]

glue the carpet to your ceiling, hey may help a little. You also don't want the drums sitting on the carpet you can run into some sound problems doing that. My studio has a painted concrete floor and heavily treated ceiling in fact about 95% treated and I get good sounds. So yes concrete floors are just fine just make sure you put something on the ceiling, and seriously the carpet on the ceiling could work for a temporary solution.

 

[Dani Pace]

This wont affect your sound, just a word about concrete floors. Concrete is notorious for absorbing and holding moisture, so standing on bare concrete can create a ground connection and possibly a shock hazard, as an electric guitar player I have had this experience and didn't care much for it. Rubber backed throw rugs work pretty well to eliminate this problem and don't affect sound very much. Also standing on bare concrete for extended periods of time will cause leg and lower back fatigue, rubber runner mats, like the ones restaurants and machine shops use are great for relief in these areas. If you want to keep the reflectiveness of the solid floor, simply lay a sheet of plywood on the floor for guitarists to stand (or sit) on.