Excessive Electronics’ Derek Woodroffe is engaged on a tool that turns a Raspberry Pi Pico W microcontroller board into a conveyable cellphone — full with 3D-printed handset: the Pi Tele Cow.
“[The Pi Tele Cow is] a easy VOIP/SIP [Voice-Over-IP/Session Initiation Protocol] moveable Wi-Fi phone handset, operating off a [Raspberry Pi Pico W] utilizing the [board’s] Wi-Fi for connectivity,” Woodroffe explains of the gadget. “Constructed to be as primary as attainable, however to have [a] working ‘usable’ handheld cellphone.”
The Pi Tele Cow turns a Raspberry Pi Pico W right into a Wi-Fi related VOIP handset — full with 3D-printed case. (📷: Derek Woodroffe)
The Pi Tele Cow, the identify and emblem for which is impressed by the traditional British Telecom design and the Raspberry Pi Pico W’s “PiCow” nickname, is constructed across the Raspberry Pi Pico W and its dual-core RP2040 microcontroller. To this, Woodroffe has added an SD Card for storage, a microphone, speaker, 15-key keyboard, SSD1306-based I2C LCD show, and a 15-key phone keypad, together with an inside battery chargeable over USB.
Regardless of its look, although, the Pi Tele Cow is neither designed to be used with landline connections nor provides mobile connectivity. As a substitute, it is designed to make use of the Wi-Fi radio on the Raspberry Pi Pico W to connect with a community — storing credentials for as much as 9 entry factors on the SD Card — and hyperlink to a SIP server to make Voice-Over-IP calls.
Woodroffe goals to promote the Pi Tele Cow as a package, and has launched the firmware supply as a work-in-progress. (📷: Derek Woodroffe)
The challenge is a work-in-progress, with Woodroffe admitting that there’s “intermittent no speech, cannot cancel [an] outgoing name earlier than reply, [it can] lock-up after calls, requires reboot to make [a] second name, [and there are] NAT calling points,” however as an preliminary proof-of-concept it has demonstrated that the Raspberry Pi Pico W is highly effective sufficient to at the least try to drive a handheld VOIP cellphone.
The supply code for the challenge has been printed to GitHub below the permissive BSD 3-Clause license, with Woodroffe planning to promote the PCB on the Excessive Kits website as soon as the design has been finalized and the firmware to-do checklist whittled down.