High quality and high-density rubber is your best choice. If I recall SCI and Foamex are two brands in North America. Living in the apartment/condo means you probably do not have control over the fluid temperature in the floor so be aware the carpet and pad will reduce the heating output. This may or may not be an issue for you. The Radiant Panel Association has an info page on this topic. Here is a link that might be useful: Carpet and Pads with Radiant Heating

My son currently works as a 3rd party engineer for one of the felt rug padding and carpet padding manufacturers Rug Pad USA, Mohawk, Shaw.... and I've actually asked him this same exact issue. I'm a designer down in Savannah GA and our summers are as humid and muggy as they come. I asked him specifically what pads would work to avoid the "Sweating" issue. My clients and I complain about this all the time - the pads get glued to the floor. One of my clients had to replace a portion of their hardwood to fix this issue. He has an engineer background does this for a living, thus most of what he said went over my head....but here's what I gathered... - A 100% felt rug pad is actually recycled polypropylene fibers but it won't ever stain, nor sweat, but the rug has to be large enough not to move. But with smaller rugs, you need to stick with a rubber or latex product to prevent "sweating" and sticking. - Felt and rubber rug pads are made with either synthetic latex (lower cost) or Natural rubber (more expensive), he thought that both should be dry enough that they shouldn't sweat between your floors. So this is what I have been recommending to my clients. I also asked him about the different materials - since I told him one of my clients floors needed to be replaced. Heres what he said "your flooring surface finishes are whats important, not whats underneath them, and to be especially careful with vinyl, acrylic, and laquered finishes. Some PVC padding, not all, can leave an imprint on this type of flooring if they don't get the formula correct, or if they use cheap fillers rather in place of proper materials, or if they haven't been tested on before. Pads that tend stick to floors, melt, sweat, are always made with pvc and essentially all come from low grade suppliers in China." Some food for thought :) - Hope this helps

Hi er1998. I've done some shopping around online and it seems the highest quality felt pads all come with a rubber backing. RugPadCorner.com and Durahold both sell felt pads like this. The two company's rug pads look identical with the patterned felt on top and purplish-coloured, dimpled rubber layer on the bottom. Both get good reviews online and I've seen RugPadCorner mentioned (with positive comments) on GW threads also. Both companies state their rubber won't adhere to HW floors or disintegrate too. Your own experience with yours over 10 years supports their claims. My manufacturer specifically states NOT to get rubber backed rugs though. The reasoning they give is that the rubber will trap moisture and damage the floor. How do I avoid getting moisture under there, especially around the sink?

We installed Cali Northshore oak longboard in our rental cabin when remodeling it and absolutely love it. The oft mentioned issue of repetiveness did arise but our installers did their best and we don't even notice it now. We are now thinking about doing the same in our main house on the entire 1st floor. I since discovered flooret and understand it's wear layer is twice as thick on the signature versions. I ordered samples. Upon comparing with Cali I still like Cali better - it's texture is more 3 dimensional and it feels better to our bare feet. The color, hue and design on the northshore is better than all the samples from flooret ( kingswood, elmsford and sutton ). The floorets are definitely nice but somehow the Cali feels better. Also the Cali rides a bit higher - it's backing is thicker than the flooret. We are torn on this decision because it seems a thicker wear layer for around the same price would be better. But in terms of appearance and feel the Cali wins out. If anyone has any suggestions I welcome them!