EverestX on SOLDIERX yearned for the simpler times of the beeper, and decided to bring them back at a personal scale with a custom Teensy-powered POCSAG pager transmitter.

In the days before everyone carried boring black slabs of always-on hyperconnectivity around in their pockets all day, being reachable away from your desk or home was actually fairly unusual — the domain of doctors, network admins, and … certain other high-income individuals. But with a growing desire among many to disconnect and simplify, the former status symbol of wearing a pager might today appeal as a minimalist messaging solution.

In addition to the Teensy LC and custom PCB, the system incorporates an RFM23BP ISM radio transceiver and HC-05 Bluetooth module. Adopting the Featherwing format resulted in some tight tolerances, but is great for prototyping, and results in a compact build that can be powered by a LiPo battery and charged via USB. EverestX didn’t even have to write any code thanks to the pocsag Arduino library by on1arf on GitHub. Read more about the project’s background, philosophy, and build notes on SOLDIERX.