Howdy yall. We are planning on installing some engineered wood floors in 2 rooms of our house. The first room is the living room (downstairs, concrete subfloor). The second is a bedroom (upstairs, wooden subfloor). I will most likely be doing most of the installation myself as my husband works long hours.

I am wondering on the sound quality floating vs. gluing down the floors will make, if any. I don't want the floors to sound hollow, but am attracted to the ease of installation the floating method offers. I'm quite handy so I am not intimidated by the gluing process. I would just prefer an easier time of it if the end result is the same.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

Glue down is always going to be the most firm and quietest application. But, if someone is willing to put forth the effort and spend some more money you can come fairly close to a glue down.

The substrate has to be flat, not close, but flat. The flooring should be at least 1/2" thick with quality milling. You really have to upgrade the underlayment too, Sound Solutions underlayment fits the bill for this or Kahrs makes a very good on called Quiet Stride I think.

I recently installed an Anderson 1/2" x 5" engineered with the Sound Solutions underlayment and one can barely perceive it floats. I spent many hours getting the concrete flat too.