Acoustical Evaluation of Multipurpose Hall by Using Computer Simulation: A Case Study of Tunku Canselor Hall Universiti Malaya

Abstract

Dewan Tunku Canselor (DTC), Universiti Malaya, is a large hall serving multiple speeches and musical performance facilities. Musical performance and speeches in a multi-purpose hall needed to be as intelligible, desirable, and engaging as possible. However, speech and musical performance required different acoustic configurations, and it is difficult to accomplish both simultaneously. Therefore, the appliance of acoustic strategy plays an important role in regulating overall acoustic performance. Many research organisations have focused on acoustics in multi-purpose halls. However, there is a lack of research on acoustic performance in Malaysia. In addition, DTC is one of the most iconic buildings and registered as one of the UNESCO Heritage Buildings in Malaysia. A lot of renovation and refurbishments have been conducted; however, the available acoustic performance to serve speeches and performance remains questionable. This paper demonstrated the acoustical performance of the available information about DTC by using computer simulation. Apart from reviewing the acoustic performance, this study denoted related alterations to improve the existing condition based on recommended criteria. This study is based on ODEON software computer simulation to analyse the specific parameter, i.e., reverberation time (T30) and speech transmission index (STI). This research validated that the current acoustical performance of DTC did not achieve optimum performance as a multi-purpose hall. Then, a recommended modification model to improve the performance arises upon the research findings and simulation results. Based on literature reviews, the proposed acoustic solution attained the best results by gaining optimum reverberation time in architectural acoustic.