The Patriots practiced inside the Dana Farber Field House today, a move, you'd assume, aimed at simulating the atmosphere the team might encounter at Lucas Oil Stadium on Sunday night.

And ... about that: this stadium's noise factor doesn't pose near the problem that the RCA Dome did. In the older indoor facilities -- you could toss the Metrodome, Superdome, Astrodome and Silverdome in that group -- it could be hard to hear the person sitting next to you.

In some of the expansive newer places, like Lucas Oil Stadium and Ford Field (domes that are structured like fieldhouses), noise doesn't get trapped the way it did in the dated domes. And it's not a secret either. My pal Gregg Rosenthal wrote about it here. And no less of an authority than Tom Brady hinted at it, as well.

"Any dome is typically loud," Brady said. "The RCA Dome was exceptionally loud, you couldn't hear anything in there. I've heard that this is a fairly loud stadium. They have great fans. The RCA Dome was - I think from what I hear - a little bit louder, Peyton actually told me that. But this one sounds much more luxurious."