Media Room - flooring

Think again, nothing will equal carpeting to get the max out of your room

I have wine room with cork floor and one wall all cork....it does NOT pass the "clap" test ....cork may be better than tile (for sure) but it is still reflective in the upper frequencies.

If you go wood then put in an underlay of acoustic absorption rubber - it will increase the cost by 2 $ sq/ft but it will help in lower frequencies a bit and then place a large rug in the middle of the room.

If you can treat the ceiling with extensive acoustic panels then a "live" floor is not so much of a problem.

Cork flooring can be really cool stuff but based on my audio experience I would pass over this softer material for the media room opting instead for a very hard flooring system with either one quite large or several smaller area rugs (and carpet pads underneath) in all the right places.

In this scenario I would also consider having plenty of overly large loose decorative pillow cushions available to potentially address hot spots.

-IMO