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The creaking almost always comes from the floor shifting and losing contact with the base, so before you do anything, lift up a plank a bit in the area that's making noise to see if there's a gap underneath. What most people don't mention is that wedging shims or adhesive without fixing why it lifted in the first place is just a waste of time, because the problem's still there underneath and it's only going to get worse.

First thing is to avoid stepping hard on the creaky areas and don't let the problem get worse. Don't try wedging things or filling empty spaces from the top without knowing exactly what's happening underneath, because you might end up damaging more planks or pushing moisture somewhere else.

Most likely there's movement between the planks or the floor shifted a bit from humidity changes, and yes, you can fix it without pulling everything up. First you need to figure out exactly where it's creaking: walk slowly over the area and mark the problem spots with tape. If the creaking comes from the joints, sometimes you can just inject a polyurethane sealant into the cracks from the top, let it expand and settle properly. If it's from general floor movement, you need to check if the subfloor is in good shape (you can drill a small test hole in a corner to check) and whether the base is level.

Another option is to nail or screw from the top at the creaky spots, using long screws that go through the floating plank and reach the subfloor, but this is more visible. If the material cost is low, a lot of people just replace the damaged planks without touching the rest, carefully removing them and putting new ones in their place. Anyway, if the floor is pretty old and badly damaged, it might be cheaper to do a proper repair job all at once.

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