A look at AT&T’s home of the future (pics)

AT&T announced its new Digital Life home automation system this morning, and we got to see the system in action in a New Orleans home during this week’s CTIA Wireless show.

The solution will compete with Verizon’s Home Monitoring and Control system and Comcast’s Xfinity Home, but from our first look, it’s pretty cool and will likely stack up well. Hacking your house isn’t easy, but Digital Life has apps and cool tricks to set AT&T’s version of the home of the future apart.

Digital Life is centered around apps that control your appliances and security. These apps are built on iOS, Android, as well as HTML5 for other web-enabled devices. Using the apps, you can see real-time feeds from cameras, turn lights on and off, close the blinds, or even lock the door while you’re away. You can even call a 24-hour security monitoring company maintained by AT&T and sound loud alarms by just moving a single sensor. The sensor will also turn on all the lights in the house if triggered.

“This is a traditional security system on steroids,” an AT&T representative told us, taking a shot at ADT, Broadview, and other security companies.

The connections to appliances are created using individual “control modules” that attach to an electrical outlet. You then plug an appliance into the module to create a wireless connection. The control module itself is the least futuristic part of the system, and it looks like a dumb white box. (Check out the last slide in the slideshow below to see how un-cool it looks.)

AT&T will run trials of the new service in Dallas and Atlanta this summer, with a national roll out in 3G-enabled areas coming some time after that. As you enable more appliances for wireless control, the cost will go up, creating a fairly customizable solution. The company refused to talk exact pricing, but I expect the initial setup and the several modules to cost a pretty penny.

Check out the gallery below to see more pictures of AT&T Digital Life in action:

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