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Hamfest Highlights – Hover to Fan Out • Click for Full Size
I posted this on Sunday (June 14, 2026) morning, then in the process of trying to add a new component to the website I totally crashed the site. I am reposting it this morning (Monday) after Club member and all-around genius Mike Spracklen (KJ5ILO) saved me by doing a restore from an earlier back up.
All,
Yesterday I drove over to the 2026 DFW HAM EXPO at Vista Ridge Mall in Lewisville. I have three quick observations:
- It continues to grow in both vendors and visitors.
- There were a ton of Meshtastic nodes in proximity.
- There were some deals to be had.
I pulled out at 0600 and after a quick stop for breakfast on the way there I arrived at 0800 as they were opening. There were probably 30-40 tailgaters. NOTE: If you decide to do that in the future, I suggest you take a pop-up shade. It was on a blacktop parking lot and as the day wore on it got hot out there.
There was a bit of a line to get into the venue. They had adequate coverage and processed people quickly, but I had to stand in line for probably 10-15 minutes. They processed people efficiently and printed out a pass and plastic holder with lanyard and I headed into the show. Major point: The AC worked VERY well. It was cold enough to hang meat in there! 🤣😂🤣😂
One vendor told me they sold all but like six tables. At 0800 only about 3/4 were set up, but by 0900 they were in full swing. They did have a couple of snack vendors, one was selling donuts and coffee, but they were wiped out pretty quickly. There was not a grill so another tip would be to have breakfast, like I did, before getting there.
They had the usual assortment of used and new gear. Ham Radio Outlet (HRO) was there and had a really nice display. I was looking for bulk Anderson Power Pole adapters and found only a few in small baggies, not what I would call bulk.
One unexpected solution presented itself. The computer the Beall’s use to host both the APRS Gateway and Broadcastify for the Club is older than I realized. It is still super strong, I custom built it myself, but in a disappointing development there is something about the motherboard/cpu combo that is not compatible with Windows 11. I looked into workarounds, but they were complicated and required one to make BIOS changes and edit the registry to fool Microsoft and the whole exercise looked like it would waste a lot of time and perhaps result in something less than ideal. I need it to just work and to not have to fool with it. Some apps are already starting to nag me about doing the Windows 11 upgrade, which it won’t do, so I was pretty happy to find a guy that had 8-10 refurbished Dell mini-towers. All were configured the same with plenty of RAM, an ample SSD and most of all – Windows 11 Professional, installed and activated. I asked him how did I know mine would operate when I got it to the house? Not DOA? He offered to connect a monitor, keyboard and mouse. I asked if he had a card instead and he did. He is out of Allen, so if there’s a problem, I can follow up with him. Cost? $140. I didn’t even try and bargain with him. OK, now I just need to get everything migrated into it and a new video card with four outputs. Yay!
While there I saw Club member and ARRL North Texas Section Manager Steven Lott Smith (KG5VK), Club President Mark Johnson (W5PTX) as well as Club members Mike Rice (WB5KWK), Thomas Sorensen (AF5WO) and Ronnie Rumsey (KA5LEK). Apologies to Ronnie, I didn’t get a picture of or with him. 😒
All-in-all I think the DFW HAM EXPO is an up and coming event. If they can continue to grow the venue I think it will be worth the annual trip, particularly if we can car pool and shoot the breeze coming and going. It only took me about two hours to cover it really thoroughly, so while a nearly two hour drive – each way – will be a consideration for me, I drove further to the mini-fest in Texarkana two weeks ago. The DFW HAM EXPO was at least five times as large, and air conditioned, so for comparison sake there are those details.
73
Phillip Beall (W5EBC)
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