What Is AT&T U-verse?

AT&T; U-verse's IPTV technology allows a home phone, wireless device, television and personal computer to link together on one network. Unlike cable or satellite television, IPTV is two-way interactive, which means your television can communicate with other devices, instead of just receiving information. In addition, because all AT&T; U-verse receivers share the same network, you can watch recorded programming on any television in your house. IPTV also enables you to program your digital video recorder (DVR) from your smartphone or personal computer and to view incoming home phone calls on your television.

AT&T; U-verse offers Total Home DVR, which allows you to record as many as four shows at the same time on one DVR. You can also record and play back programming from any room in your house, pause a recorded show in one room and resume playback in another room, and play up to four recorded shows at once using Multiview, which splits the screen into four separate viewing boxes. Many AT&T; U-verse DVRs are high-definition ready and can store as many as 233 hours of standard definition programming.

AT&T; U-verse offers as many as 160 HD channels and a variety of packages you can change at any time without incurring a change fee. As of June, 2011, there are seven packages available, including a basic package that only provides local channels, and the most advanced package, which provides as many as 410 channels with HD service. Each package includes one DVR, and additional DVRs are available for a monthly fee.

AT&T; U-verse also offers high-speed Internet using Wireless Gateway technology that links the computers and televisions in your house to the Internet through Wi-Fi, a USB port or Ethernet. This enables you to connect printers, Wi-Fi cameras and storage devices to the Internet and provides encryption security through a professional-grade firewall. There are multiple plans available with different downstream speeds, but every plan offers emailing, music download, social networking and photo-sharing. Other features include online conferencing, Internet gaming, movie download and video conferencing.

U-verse Voice is a digital home phone service that offers more than 20 calling features and lets you keep the number and phone you have after you switch. Features include busy call forwarding, call forwarding, call screening, call transfer, caller ID blocking and call history. Other features include caller ID on TV that lets you view an incoming call on your television and provides a message waiting indicator to alert you when a caller leaves a voicemail. The Click to Call feature enables you to choose a number in the call history log on your computer or television using a mouse or a remote control. Once you click the number, you just pick up your phone to talk.