Best Carpet Padding

Omalon

I'd let your wife have the thick padding. It can be your way of saying, "i love you" :) Besides, there's a larger chance that the thick pad will result in better sound.

Don't tell her it might be better, act like it is a HUGE sacrafice and she might have to give back a little as far as the speaker placement goes!

Why should the floor be treated differently from any other reflective surface? If you heavily pad the floor then heavily pad the rest. If your walls and ceilings are reflective why should the floor be inert? Because emphasizing slap-echo is inherently preferable? Or maybe fine tuning comb-filtering for maximum interference is your thing? Less is often-times more, IMHO.

The floor should be treated differently because it is really close to the drivers and your ears and reflections off the floor will be the FIRST to hit your ears and smear your sound. The walls are generally further away from the drivers.

The other posters are correct in saying that thicker is better. Furthermore, you should use cotton or wool padding because the fibers will be of irregular length and diameter and will absorb relatively uniformly across the spectrum. Man-made materials are very consistent and will give a peaky absorption/reflection pattern. Enjoy.