I saw the Dark Knight in Imax yesterday at The Minnesota Zoo, and it was much to loud.
Max spl at normal theaters is 105db, at home I listen with peaks around 90db.
I am aware that 24bit soundtracks can reach about 140dbs.
The Imax was uncomfortably loud, we were in the last row so I can only imagine how much air was being displaced.
Anyone have any similar experiences?

Odd; I saw Spider-man 3, The Dark Knight, and 300 (twice in a row on opening night) in IMAX and I was expecting them all to be quite loud, but none of them were anywhere remotely bordering on too loud, much less uncomfortably so. They were all very reasonably leveled. Hell, I actually wouldn't have minded another 10db or so.

Perhaps it is a managerial decision.

same as Emperor's experience with Dark Knight, not too loud at all

ditto

I've seen two IMAX features at two different theaters and would describe both as being uncomfortably loud at times. Base volume is fine, but dynamic range is unbelievable. One of these movies I bought on DVD and the dynamic range is similar in my HT.

I saw the Dark Knight in Imax yesterday at The Minnesota Zoo, and it was much to loud.
Max spl at normal theaters is 105db, at home I listen with peaks around 90db.
I am aware that 24bit soundtracks can reach about 140dbs.
The Imax was uncomfortably loud, we were in the last row so I can only imagine how much air was being displaced.
Anyone have any similar experiences?
We saw the Dark Knight yesterday, in Austin, Bob Bullock IMAX. The audio was good, action scenes were loud, but not uncomfortably loud that they sometimes get.

The Theatre you went to has been adjusted from reference or has some other issue.