For more than 40 years, the Dee Events Center (DEC) has served as the home court of the NCAA Division I WSU Wildcats men’s and women’s basketball teams, as well as hosting many Big Sky Conference championship games. The domed arena – which is on the campus of Weber State University (WSU) in Ogden, Utah – was recently equipped a new L-Acoustics Kara(i) loudspeaker system, designed and installed by Salt Lake City’s Poll Sound.

Capable of seating nearly 11,600 spectators in its circular bowl, the venue is truly multipurpose, having hosted other college and professional sports, major touring concerts, and religious and community events. Although the school has continually invested in upgrades to the venue over the years, DEC’s sound reinforcement system had remained unchanged for more than a quarter century, and had become decreasingly effective over time.

‘The facility’s previous sound system probably performed okay when it was installed back in the 1990s but “state-of-the-art” has changed a lot since then, leaving the Dee Events Center behind in terms of impact and intelligibility,’ says Poll Sound Owner Deward Timothy, who headed the new L-Acoustics system design.

Timothy notes that the old system was especially lacking with non-sports events where a stage is set up at one end of the court. ‘A centre hung array has a disadvantage in this type of set-up, which is our usual scenario for ceremonies, speeches, main assemblies, graduations, small concerts, and so on. So we were given the directive to come up with a new design that would work well for both sports and stage events.’

The Poll Sound team used L-Acoustics Soundvision design software to find the optimum solution for the venue. The result was a bowl system comprising 66 Kara(i) enclosures and a dozen SB18i subs. These are divided into six identical arrays of 11 Kara, plus two adjacent SB18, evenly spaced around the cloud and scoreboard above centre court and hung directly from the ceiling of the geodesic dome. For power, a dozen LA12X amplified controllers are split into four racks positioned around the cloud catwalk.

‘We modelled a variety of loudspeaker configurations in Soundvision, and this arrangement of Kara arrays represented the best overall solution with the main considerations being consistent coverage, maximum SPL and intelligibility, weight constraints, ease of installation, and cost,’ says Timothy. He adds that Kara has than proven itself on numerous other Poll Sound NCAA arena projects, including Brigham Young University Marriott Center and University of Utah Huntsman Center.

To meet the challenge of having audio originate from the stage, Poll Sound placed four medium-throw L-Acoustics Syva co-linear loudspeaker atop Syva Low enclosures on the stage floor.

‘These provide the audio precedence and floor coverage, and delay portions of the main array back to the stage,’ Timothy says. ‘This is easy to do because we can create coverage zones with the positioning of the Kara arrays; for example, those facing back to the podium and blocked off areas are not turned on when using the stage.’ All of this zoning and variation in set-ups is managed through presets that Poll Sound programmed into LA Network Manager.

Timothy’s team also supplied the facility with eight short-throw X8 coaxial enclosures for use as stage monitors and for front fill as needed, plus three four-channel LA4X amplified controllers for power and processing.

Due to pandemic restrictions, DEC hasn’t hosted events since the sound system installation; however, it hasn’t stopped the team there from being impressed with the new set-up.

‘We have been very pleased with the coverage and clarity of the sound system at all points from the court floor to the top of the arena,’ reports WSU Assistant Director of Event and Sports Facilities, Mark Livingston, who has been with the school for 13 years. ‘When our current Director and I first heard Poll Sound starting to test the system from her office, it sounded so clear that we thought we were hearing the full system, when in fact, it was just the first line array that they had flown. Even that one array was outperforming our entire old system.

‘This sound system has been one of the greatest upgrades I have seen for the university in my years with Weber State,’ he adds. ‘With 22 high school graduations and all the speaking events that we hold here at the Dee Events Center, this new L-Acoustics system is a major upgrade that will help the rest of the venue shine. We’re also very excited to finally be able to tie touring concerts and performances into our sound system, which is something we’ve always had to hire out in the past. Both L-Acoustics and Poll Sound – especially Dan Salmond, who was the best project lead I have ever had the pleasure of working with – were amazing, going well above and beyond what we expected. We’re so happy with what we’re now hearing here at the Dee, and we can’t wait for WSU Wildcats fans and our other patrons to experience it for themselves.’