It wasn't all that long ago that huge swaths of critics were claiming Steve Jobs' keypad free cell phone would never take off, and I find myself wondering what they would have made of this steampunky contraption by a YouTuber calling himself Mr. Volt. It's a working cell phone, but it's controlled by an old rotary dial rather than the gridded keypad that's been the norm on tactile phones since the mid-'80s.It's even got a screen on it, but don't expect to play Angry Birds. The color OLED display itself can only command 96×64 pixels, and the whole contraption's powered by a weak Adafruit Feather Fona motherboard, which can send SMS text messages, support a SIM card and an FM radio, and store a single number in its contacts.The 2,000 mAh LiPo battery should be able to power all that and a speaker for days, but it's also got a sleep mode if you want to get every last drop of energy out of a charge.As cool as it looks, it shows why rotary cell phones aren't exactly common. My stubby fingers have a hard enough time fitting into the slots for a normal old rotary my parents still have, and the slots are so tiny here that Mr. Volt has to use a stylus to get the dial to move comfortably. It's a chore to use, and somehow that's why it'd also make an awesome conversation piece.Mr. Volt used ABS thermoplastic to make the case with a 3D printer, and sanded the aluminum and brass that make up the rest of the construction.Mr. Volt's creation isn't the first rotary cell phone, but it's probably the best looking. Just last year, a developer named Stavros Korokithakis converted an old rotary phone into a mobile phone solely for the pleasure of slamming down the receiver after a frustrating call.As Hackaday reported in 2014, Jaromir Sukuba of Slovakia made one for a competition that looks a bit like a standard (and finger-friendly) rotary dial slapped on a garage door opener (below). It doesn't even have all of Mr. Volt's fancy features, although Sukuba did post the files he used on Github for anyone wishing to follow in his backwards-leading footsteps.The best part? Unlike Mr. Volt's phone, you could probably stuff Sukuba's phone in your pocket.
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