Service Highlight | TC Furlong Saves the Show

At TC Furlong, we pride ourselves on being ready and able to answer the call. Over the last 50 years, we’ve made a significant effort to prove ourselves as a beacon of reliability and expertise among the many professional audio service providers in the greater Chicagoland area. Every day in our shop, our team of dedicated audio specialists work tirelessly to ensure that the music never stops and the shows always go on. 

One of the key service values offered at TC Furlong is the Emergency Audio Response hotline, a lifeline service available to our customers, 24/7 + 365. We’d like to give you a little insight into how one of our customers recently took advantage of this service, and how our timely response helped save their whole weekend of performances.

One fateful Thursday evening, the hotline rang with urgency. On the other end of the line was a voice wrought with desperation… a customer in dire need of professional audio assistance! With less than 24 hours until show time, a troublesome power amplifier/DSP unit, matched to the manufacturer’s loudspeakers, started to act up. The customer’s show, a carefully choreographed masterpiece months in the making, hung in the balance, threatened by a pesky technical failure. But for TC Furlong, challenges are but opportunities in disguise, and the team wasted no time in springing into action.

By the next morning, a TC Furlong representative had already removed the affected amplifier from the venue, and the techs in the shop began work on getting a replacement unit in line from our rental inventory. This was no ordinary swap; it was a seamless transition, a ballet of technology orchestrated with finesse. The replacement amp arrived at the venue by midday Friday, pre-loaded with all the necessary DSP presets, which were downloaded from the defective amp back at the shop. After some adapters were added, the amp was a drop-in replacement; a plug-and-play solution born from the marriage of technology and expertise, and a testament to TC Furlong’s unwavering customer support.

As the curtains rose on the evening’s performance, there was a palpable sense of anticipation in the air. But thanks to TC Furlong’s responsiveness, technical knowhow, and dedication to excellent customer service, the show unfolded flawlessly. TC Furlong’s Emergency Audio Response hotline helped amplify the night, once again proving our reliability and excellence amidst the ever-changing and unpredictable landscape of live performance entertainment.

Interested in renting from TC Furlong? Call our office today at 847-367-9588 or send an email to rental@tcfurlong.com.

Interested in purchasing your own gear? We are dealers for over 100 professional audio manufacturers. Call our office today at 847-367-9588 or send an email to sales@tcfurlong.com and we’ll get started on a quote!

Service Highlight | SMAART System Tuning

At TC Furlong, we provide our customers with a myriad of professional audio service offerings like system design, wireless systems analysis and coordination, system commissioning, and also sound system tuning and alignment with Rational Acoustics SMAART. Our team of seasoned engineers is prepared to help you get the most out of your gear for the space it’s in — Whether it’s a previously installed system, a mobile rig, or your Church’s brand new line array, we have the tools and experience necessary to tune your sound system to achieve its best performance using SMAART.

We’ve recently upgraded our SMAART Suite to ver. 9

Our measurement and analysis tool, Rational Acoustics’ SMAART Suite, is an industry leading system measurement software.  It is designed to provide real time analysis of system response, phase coherence, and many other useful analysis tools to optimize audio system performance. SMAART Suite also has SPL monitoring functions, and is a popular choice for live sound engineers to keep track of volume levels over time.

One of our Earthworks M30 omnidirectional measurement microphones in action

At the front end of our rig is the Earthworks M30 omnidirectional measurement microphone, which is a popular choice for engineers looking for a reliable measurement solution. With a notably flat frequency response from 3hz to 30khz, the M30 provides an accurate representation of your system within the room.

Our SMAART system helped us tune our flown Meyer Sound LINA line array system for a recent in-house event

Are you interested in getting your system aligned or one of TC Furlong’s many other professional audio services? Call our office today at 847-367-9588 or send an email to align-design@tcfurlong.com to get started.

DPA & Wisycom | Live Event Recap

Thank you to all of you who joined us for the DPA & Wisycom live demo event! We were very pleased to see the excitement around the gear and grateful to provide the opportunity to get hands-on experience with each company’s respective product line, talk directly with manufacturer reps, and interface with other Chicagoland audio industry professionals.

DPA Microphones representatives J.C. Bittence and Paul Andrews brought the full gamut of their outstanding microphone line, including the 4099, the new 4055 kick drum microphone, the awesome looking location sound recording kit, and many, many of their high end subminiature lavalier and headset microphone options. We even had the opportunity to utilize the 4097 choir microphone as a group capture for multiple vocalists during the demo.

Also showcasing their industry leading products was Geoff Baynard, Product Marketing Manager at Wisycom, who provided all the wireless microphone and IEM systems used for the event. Attendees were able to tune in and listen into IEM mixes of the performers on the provided Wisycom hardware during the demo, and swap between 4 separate IEM mixes in real time. Engineers were able to hear and switch between the individual microphones, as well as the performer’s mixes and the main house feed, all triggered from the display on the Wisycom MPR50-IEM bodypacks. Alongside the IEM systems, Wisycom MTH410 wireless handheld units were used for speech reinforcement during the demonstrations, vocal reinforcement during the performances, and each of our acoustic instrument performers had MTP61 miniature wireless transmitters for their DPA 4099 instrument microphones.

See below for a gallery that highlights the live demo experience. We are looking forward to providing more events with our manufacturer partners like this in the near future!

Interested in renting DPA or Wisycom products? Send a message to rentals@tcfurlong.com or call our office at 847-367-9588 and our experienced team of audio technicians will help you choose the right components for your next event!

Interested in getting some DPA or Wisycom for yourself? We are authorized DPA & Wisycom dealers as well as dealers for over 100 other manufacturers. Our sales team is ready to help and can be reached at sales@tcfurlong.com or by phone 847-367-9588. Contact us today for a quote!

This unique live setting allowed the group to experiment with microphone placement on many types of acoustic instruments

DPA and Wisycom representatives were available to interface directly with end users to answer questions and develop relationships

Our new Yamaha DM7 console drove the show, and interfaced well with the Wisycom wireless rack via Dante

ProTools multitrack recording for playback comparison of microphones and techniques during the demo

Up-close view of the Wisycom rack

The Wisycom system on display provided all wireless microphone and IEM transmission

A display table chock full of all the excellent microphone choices that DPA has to offer

The PA being tuned in the days leading up to the event using Rational Acoustics SMAART

New In Rentals – Yamaha DM7 Control Expansion

The Yamaha CTL-DM7 is an expansion controller for the DM7 and DM7C digital consoles, equipped with a multitude of additional physical control devices that greatly expand functions and parameters for a number of audio applications. The slim, sidecar-like expansion further increases the power and customization of your DM7 or DM7C console workflow by adding 4 banks of 12 user defined keys (for a total of 48 additional UDKs), 4 user defined knobs, scene memory keys, a programmable jog wheel, 2 sets of monitor control keys and knobs, a surround sound panner joystick, and an additional pair of two assignable faders. The CTL-DM7 can also be equipped with software upgrade packages that further increase the functionality of the controller. Both of the available broadcast and theater software upgrade packages are available as part of your CTL-DM7 rental with TC Furlong Inc.

CTL-DM7 is shown here outlined in blue, installed on a DM7 console.
The CTL-DM7 can also be installed on the smaller-format DM7C console.

The CTL-DM7 is available to rent with two software upgrade packages that unlock additional features for the controller, which are the Broadcast Package and the Theater Package. The first adds broadcast-specific functions like mix minus, fader cue release, back stop PFL, audio follow video, source selection mix mode, speaker selection, a loudness meter and peak program meters, as well as a future update coming for full 5.1 surround sound mixing support. The Theatre Package supplements your DM7 or DM7C with a bevy of theater-friendly production features like mix minus, 4 bank EQ/DYN, an actor library, DCA presets, DCA scene grid, MIDI output event on scene, and Yamaha’s AFC image control for immersive audio.

An up-close look at the expanded controls offered with the CTL-DM7.

Looking for more info on the Yamaha DM7, DM7C and CTL-DM7? You can find all the product information for the DM7 series of digital consoles here on the Yamaha website.

Ready to take your rental to the next level with the Yamaha DM7/DM7C digital console, coupled with the CTL-DM7 control expansion? Send a message to rentals@tcfurlong.com or call our office at 847-367-9588 and our experienced team of audio technicians will help you build the perfect DM7 mixing system for your next event!

Interested in getting into the new Yamaha DM7 series yourself? We are authorized Yamaha dealers as well as dealers for over 100 other manufacturers. Our sales team is ready to help and can be reached at sales@tcfurlong.com or by phone 847-367-9588. Contact us today for a quote!

TC Furlong Inc. Presents Digital Console Expo 2023

Thank you to all who joined us for the return of our in-person Digital Console Expo, which was held on December 7th at Moody Church in Chicago. The event featured 5 manufacturers of digital consoles and console peripherals, including:

Allen & Heath
AVID
Yamaha
LAWO
Tascam

The event hosted around 100 attendees, including technicians from houses of worship, broadcasters, sound/AV companies, and performing arts facilities, as well as touring engineers, students, integrators, and consultants. People traveled from across Chicagoland and the Midwest to attend this year’s event, allowing for unique networking opportunities that are typically only available at larger tech expos.

In addition to the opportunity to learn about the latest product offerings directly from manufacturer representatives, this free event featured ample amounts of swag giveaways and food; attendees also had the opportunity to see many items from our extensive rental inventory on display, including our most popular microphones, compact loudspeakers, wireless systems and accessories.

TC Furlong Inc. is proud to be an authorized dealer for all of the manufacturers featured at this year’s expo. If you’d like more information on any of the featured products, or need to request a quote, please contact our Sales Team at sales@tcfurlong.com or call 847-367-9588.

We also carry many of the brands featured at DCE 2023 in our rental inventory. For more information about renting a digital console, or anything else from our vast rental inventory, get in touch with our Rental Team at rentals@tcfurlong.com or call 847-367-9588.

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