I am building a new house and the master bedroom is over the living room which will have an HT set up in it and I am trying to reduce the amount of potential noise in the master bedroom... I am unfortunately not able to drop the ceiling at all so I am left with attacking the problem from the master bedroom floor down. Here are a couple of options that I have come up with, both of my plans include caulking all the cracks. Any tips, suggestions or help would be appreciated.

1. hardwood floor - underlayment - plywood - green glue - plywood - joists with r-13 insulation - drywall

or

2. hardwood floor - underlayment - MLV - plywood - joists with r-13 insulation - drywall...

I am not looking to spend a huge amount but I am also not looking for soundproof but for something where some one can watch a movie at reasonable but low level and not disturb me sleeping directly above.

Green Glue has many fans, but if the illustration below shows an MLV installation, and very importantly the gyp board ceiling below suspended on resilient channels. The suspended ceiling will do much of the work. Two layers of gyp board separated by channels would work well. It looks like it would work as advertised.
http://www.soundproofing.org/images/ceiling_proof.jpg

trekguy,

thanks for that, the diagram shows the installation that I was talking about, well except with carpet instead of Hardwoods.... But I am unable to do drop the ceiling at all, which means I am unable to do resilient channels or double drywall with GG. I can only attack the problem from the top down. Which of my too options to do you think would work better? Or is there another approach you would advise?

1. hardwood floor - underlayment - plywood - green glue - plywood - joists with r-13 insulation - drywall

or

2. hardwood floor - underlayment - MLV - plywood - joists with r-13 insulation - drywall

are you looking to block LFE resonance into the bedroom from the basement? or just all around noise levels?

knowing exactly what your trying to tackle is the first battle.

- Josh

Just generally lower the noise level... My goal is that some one can watch a movie directly below me in the living room at a reasonable level and have it not disturb me in the bedroom above... Or anther example, I am a huge F1 racing fan. because of the location of the races some start in the middle of the night. I would like to be able to watch these without disturbing anyone sleeping above... The living room is on the first level and the bedroom on the 2nd.

The house is not built yet so I don't know exactly how good or bad the sound might be nor the frequancies that might be transfered... I will say that the person in the living room should show some consideration e.g. the volume will be at reasonable level with the sub is turned off, my floor standing speakers have a range of 30-44hz

Just generally lower the noise level... My goal is that some one can watch a movie directly below me at a resasobale level and have it not disturbe me in the bedroom above... Or anther example, I am a huge F1 racing fan. because of the location of the races some start in the middle of the night. I would like to be able to watch these without disturbing anyone sleeping above...

The house is not built yet so I don't know exactly how good or bad the sound might be nor the frequancies that might be transfered... I will say that the person in the living room should show some consideration e.g. the volume will be at reasonable level with the sub is turned off, my floor standing speakers have a range of 30-44hz

ok then, the route you plan on going won't work, you'll have many many other weak points within the home, the walls themselves, the HVAC vents, windows, ect...

trying to isolate noise is a black art, but doing things like decoupleing the drywall, or doing two layers of drywall, treating the HVAC system, using solid core doors, ect... are really the ONLY way to isolate the noise.

If you put all that work into the floors, and expect it to work, honestly it'll be a huge waste of money.

You'll be better off treating the entire room itself, if you can't do things like RSIC clips and hat channel, look into doing two layers of dry wall with green glue, and maybe a layer of MLV before the sheet rock goes up.

I have a general viewing room, its not a dedicated theater room, but what I did was two layers of sheet rock with green glue.

I did R19 insulation in the ceiling and walls.

and wrapped all my HVAC trunks with the sound deadening materials used in cars.

I then also installed a solid core door for the room.

after all that I still get some low frequency resonance through out the home, but its alot less than I though it was going to be. I've also got one floor between my bedrooms and my basement room so that alone helps out greatly.

- Josh

In my audio room, which delivered on SOME of the goals I had, along these lines, I used 3 5/8" drywall layers, glued together and screwed to Z strip to the triple-braced floor joists above. The edges of that thick ceiling barely contact the walls through a narrow foam barrier. The theory is to allow the ceiling to move, but not allow it to move the walls or the floor of the room above, as sound energy is dissipated through the Z strip and the edge foam.

Sound energy can be thought of as being transduced to mechanical energy, conducted through whatever structure is available, to vibrate (radiate noise) elsewhere. Therefore, I tried to totally eliminate ALL mechanical pathways, adding insulation materials to disperse air transmission of sound, through any voids..

Increasing the mass of components by using sticky mat material (thickens the sheet metal in cars), solid core doors, additional bracing to tie structural components together or thicker layers of drywall, lowers the frequency of the sound that travels. That is what drives your "not using the sub-woofer". High frequency noise has lower Q (energy level) and is not as huge a factor as low frequency (much higher Q); paralleling the amplifier power required to deliver equivalent sound at those frequencies. Also, almost no home structural components' resonant frequencies are at the higher audible freqs.

I switched from insulation to isolation as my guide,then found that the HVAC duct was the weak link. I lined it as best I could with a special sound deadening, thick cloth-like material, for which it was designed. Luckily, I had a neighbor, who had some material left from a theme park project.

I have an audiophile recording which contains the faint sound of a subway train, indicating how difficult this endeavor is, even for professionals.

The house is not built yet

so then why can't you do RC or double drywall? Not a full drop ceiling, mind you. RC or double drywall only drop the ceiling a couple of inches. Seriously, you will get 1000% better results trying to address it now, before its built then by trying to add something to the floor later.