Flat panel speaker rental in Dallas-Fort Worth: the Flat Panel Audio DML500.
A slim flat panel loudspeaker for rooms that want the sound with the hardware out of view. Bending wave panel technology, 165 degrees of even coverage, and an enclosure thin enough to sit against a wall in a gallery or a historic chapel with the visual footprint of a picture frame. Delivered, placed, tuned and run by our crew across the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex.
What a flat panel speaker is, and what makes the DML500 different
Panel Bending wave DML · carbon fiber and Nomex honeycomb · four neodymium motors · 165 degree coverage
A conventional loudspeaker moves air with a cone. A piston pushes forward and back, and the sound leaves the front of the box in a beam that gets narrower as the frequency rises. That is why a room covered by cone speakers has a loud spot in front of each one and a dull spot between them, and why the person sitting off to the side hears less of the top end than the person in the middle.
A flat panel speaker works on a different principle. Instead of a cone, it uses a stiff, light panel that is excited into bending waves across its whole surface. The panel moves in thousands of small modes at once. Thousands of small vibrational modes are spread across it at once, and the sound leaves as a diffuse wavefront rather than as a beam. In the Flat Panel Audio DML500 that panel is a carbon fiber and Nomex honeycomb composite, driven by four neodymium motor structures, inside an enclosure slim enough to hang like a picture frame.
The practical result is 165 degrees of horizontal coverage that stays intelligible right out to the edges. Speech holds together in a room where a cone box would be beaming past half the audience, and the level falls off far more gently as you walk away from it, so the front row stays comfortable while the level reaches the back row. It is a PA speaker, so it carries a program at real event levels rather than being a decorative background music panel.
Low-profile panel speakers compared with the visual footprint of a speaker on a stick
Four differences that decide whether a flat panel loudspeaker is the right call for your room. Each one points to a specific set of jobs a panel does well, and we will tell you honestly whether yours is one of them.
Coverage across the room
Panel 165 degrees horizontal · diffuse wavefront
A cone speaker narrows as frequency rises, so the seats off axis lose consonants first. The panel spreads a diffuse field across 165 degrees, which keeps speech readable at the sides of a room from the same panel. In a wide, shallow room that is often the difference between one flat panel and a pair of boxes on stands.
How the level drops with distance
Panel Gentler falloff · smaller front to back spread
A point source loses roughly six decibels every time the distance doubles, which is why the first two rows get hammered so the last two rows can hear. The panel's falloff is gentler, so the range between the nearest listener and the furthest one is narrower. A gallery talk stays comfortable at the front and audible at the back off one system.
A low-profile panel that hangs like a picture frame
Panel Low-profile enclosure · wall mount, stand or ground stack
This is the reason most people call about it. The DML500 is a thin panel that can sit flat against a wall or on a low-profile base, instead of a black trapezoid on a tripod at head height. In a room that has been styled by a designer, or photographed for a brand, a speaker with the footprint of a picture frame is worth a lot.
Where a cone speaker still wins
Panel Add subwoofers for music and dancing
A flat panel is a mid and high device. It covers speech and background music beautifully; a dance floor, a live band or a rave wants a subwoofer alongside it. Pair it with subwoofers and it covers music well. For a DJ set, a band or a party where the bass is the point, we will say so and quote you a conventional rig instead.
Panel speakers for events in rooms that will not take a speaker on a stick
The call almost always starts the same way: the venue, the designer or the client wants every speaker out of sight, and somebody still has to be heard. These are the rooms where that comes up in Dallas-Fort Worth, and what we do in each one.
Museums and galleriesOpenings, donor events, curator talks
The art is the reason people are in the room, and a speaker on a tripod in front of a hung work is a problem before anybody turns it on. Flat panels go against a wall or on low-profile bases below sightline, cover the floor evenly for a talk that moves around the space, and come down with every wall surface untouched. Conservation staff care about what gets rigged and where, and we advance that with them rather than arriving with a plan.
Historic venues and houses of worshipStone, glass, long reverb
Older rooms are difficult speech environments and they are rarely willing to be rigged. Hard stone and glass keep energy in the room long after the word has finished, so a beamy speaker pointed at the ceiling turns a sermon into mush. A diffuse panel field puts less energy into the reflective surfaces overhead and more into the seated area, which is why intelligibility comes up in the same room. Where a wireless microphone is in play, our AI-powered De-Feedback system runs on every channel, which is what buys usable gain in a room that wants to ring.
Corporate rooms with sightline rulesProduct launches, showrooms, press
A launch stage gets designed months before anyone asks where the audio goes, and the answer is usually that there is nowhere for it. Flat panels sit inside a set, against a back wall or flanking a screen at a height below the camera line. For anything being filmed or streamed, that matters twice, because a speaker in shot is a speaker in the recording that goes on the company's channel afterward.
Upscale retail and hospitalityTrunk shows, activations, hotel salons
Retail activations and hotel function rooms are styled to within an inch of their lives and are usually small enough that a full PA is overkill. A panel or a pair covers the space for a host, a short program and background music, tucks against a wall out of the traffic pattern, and reads as part of the room rather than as gear that showed up.
Weddings at venues that ban visible speakersCeremonies, chapels, garden rooms
A growing number of DFW wedding venues have a written rule about visible black boxes in the ceremony space, and the aisle photograph is the reason. Flat panels solve the picture and the coverage at once: even level across seating that is wider than it is deep, a clean frame, and the officiant's wireless microphone running through the same system. Reception audio is a separate conversation, because the dance floor needs low end, which is a subwoofer's job.
Conference breakouts and panel sessionsMeetings, seminars, training rooms
Breakout rooms are wide, low ceilinged and full of people sitting well off center. That geometry suits a flat panel and gives a pair of tops on sticks trouble. Panels along the front wall give the whole room the same intelligibility, and the presenter hears their own voice arrive on time.
Not sure the room needs a panel speaker?
Send us the venue, the guest count and a photo of the space, and we will tell you honestly whether a flat panel system is the right tool or whether a standard PA in a better position would do the same job. We would rather put the correct system in the room than the interesting one.
Renting the Flat Panel Audio DML500 sound system in Dallas-Fort Worth
Included Delivery · placement and tuning · on site technician · strike and collection · full insurance
Every flat panel speaker rental here is a service with a crew attached. We deliver to the venue, place the panels where they cover the seating rather than where there happens to be a power outlet, run and dress the cable clear of every walkway, tune the system to the room, and line check every input before guests arrive. A technician stays with it for the event, then we strike it and take it away. We bring the flat panel speakers, place them, and coil every cable ourselves at the end.
A DML500 rarely goes out on its own. Most rooms need a mixer, wireless microphones, playback and sometimes a subwoofer underneath for music, and all of that is quoted on the same line rather than farmed out. Wireless microphones run our AI-powered De-Feedback system, which is worth more here than almost anywhere else: the rooms that want flat panel speakers are also the reverberant, hard surfaced rooms where a microphone rings first.
Every rental is fully insured, and venues that ask for a certificate of insurance get one before load in. If your venue has rigging restrictions, a conservation policy or a load in window measured in minutes, tell us at the quote stage and we will advance it with them directly.
What booking a flat panel system looks like from your side
Four steps, and only the first one needs anything from you.
Tell us the room
Date, venue, guest count, the shape of the space and what is happening in it. A photo of the room helps more than a floor plan, because we are looking at surfaces and sightlines as much as dimensions.
We advance the venue
Load in times, doors, elevators, power, and any rule about what may be mounted, leaned or stood on the floor. Museums and historic venues usually have all four, and it is faster if we ask them than if you do.
We place it and tune it
Panels go where the coverage says they should go, cable is run and dressed, and the system is tuned to the room with a person standing where the speaker will speak. Microphones are rung out before doors, not during the program.
We run it and load out
A technician stays on the system through the event, riding microphone levels and playback, then everything comes down and goes back on the truck afterward.
Things we will point you elsewhere for
Cheaper to read this now than to find out on a planning call.
What is included
We are a service company. Delivery, placement, tuning, an on site technician and collection are all part of the booking. We bring the flat panel speakers, place them and run them for the length of your event.
Permanent installation
Wall mounted panel speakers as a fixed install in a building are a different trade with different licensing. We bring the system in for the event and take it out again. If you want panels installed permanently we are happy to point you toward someone who does that properly.
Panel speakers for a dance floor
A flat panel is a mid and high device. For a DJ set, a live band or a party where people are dancing, we will quote you a conventional system with subwoofers, because that is what the job needs.
Selling equipment
We used to offer panel loudspeakers for purchase and we stopped. Everything is full service rental now: delivered, placed, tuned, run by a technician and collected. If you want to own a system for a room you keep, ask and we will point you toward a dealer.
Quoting from a photo of the speaker
Panel counts and placement come from your room, your seating and your program. We would rather ask three questions about the space than send a quote built around a product because it looks good.
Panels are one system out of a much larger inventory
A flat panel is the right answer for some rooms, and a conventional cabinet is the right answer for others. The full inventory list covers speakers, subwoofers, microphones, mixing, projection and lighting, and we would rather put the correct system in your room than the one you asked for by name.
Flat panel speaker rental across the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex
We work from Hurst, between Dallas and Fort Worth, and cover roughly a 40 mile radius. If your venue is further out, ask anyway and we will tell you honestly whether it works.
Flat panel speaker questions
What is a flat panel speaker?
How is the DML500 different from a regular PA speaker?
Can you use flat panel speakers for a live event, or are they only for background music?
Why do flat panel speakers work better in reverberant rooms?
Our venue does not allow visible speakers. Does this solve that?
How many flat panels does a room need?
What is included in a rental?
Do you rent flat panel speakers outside Dallas?
Send us the room and what is happening in it. We'll tell you what covers it.
Tell us about your event and you'll hear back from us today, with a straightforward quote within 24 hours.