Another riser question

Carpet under the riser is wasteful.

But a good idea if you want to make the room so that the riser could be removed easily for resale.

Ever see carpet and pad that had a riser on top of it for a couple of years? It will never recover. If you build a quality theater in the basement it will only add to the resale value, Ripping out a good theater so that you have a blank windowless room makes little marketing sense. If you are converting a bedroom or dining room then there is some merit to that thought.

If you carpet first, you could always put your riser up on feet, that way you just have some small indentations in the carpet instead of the indentation of the full riser. But I agree with BIG, it's a waste of carpet for a basement build that will likely remain a theater.