so ive been trying to keep up with everything going on and its a lot right now. first off, anyone else been following the chatter about Icom teasing something at the next hamfest? saw a post on one of the facebook groups about it but couldnt find any solid info, just speculation mostly. someone mentioned a possible successor to the 7300 but i have no idea if thats real or just wishful thinking at this point.

also completely separate thing — 10 meters has been absolutely insane this past week or so. i work mostly HF and i hadnt touched 10m in like two years because it was just dead every time i checked. fired it up Tuesday evening on a whim and the band was wide open, worked stations in Brazil, a couple in Europe, even got a reply from someone in Japan which i honestly did not expect. solar flux has been climbing and i think we might actually be hitting something close to a real cycle peak or at least close to it.

anyway if anyone has actual info about new gear coming out or upcoming events id love to hear it. feels like a good time to be back in the hobby after a slow couple years.

yeah the 10m opening thing is real, i noticed it too. been running just 50 watts into a wire dipole and working stuff i normally wouldnt touch without a big antenna setup. had a qso with a station in Italy that was just booming in, S9 plus, it was almost surreal compared to what that band sounded like two winters ago.

as for the Icom rumor i wouldnt hold your breath too much. ive seen that "7300 replacement" rumor float around like three times in the past two years and nothing ever came of it. that said Yaesu did drop the FT-710 kind of quietly and people slept on it at first so who knows. might be worth waiting to see what actually shows at Dayton if anything. the hamvention announcements are usually where the real stuff drops anyway.

omg yes 10m has been crazy i got my technician like 8 months ago and everyone kept telling me to just be patient with HF and now im finally understanding what they meant lol. my elmer had me listen on 28.400 and there were like a dozen stations just chatting casually from all over the place. i didnt transmit yet because im still a little nervous about jumping into a pileup but just hearing it was so cool. didnt realize the solar cycle made such a huge differnce honestly.