Information processing apparatus that controls shifting between power states in accordance with remaining storage capacity and control method thereof

• US 10,642,545 B2
• Filed: 01/30/2019
• Issued: 05/05/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 08/05/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha (Canon Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha (Canon Inc.)
• Inventors: Wang, Xiaoli
• Primary Examiner(s): Zheng, Jacky X
• Application Number:
  US16/261,958
• Publication Number:
  US 20190163419A1
• Time in Patent Office: 461 Days
• CPC Class Codes: B41J 29/38 Drives, motors, controls or automatic cut-off devices for the entire printing mechanism
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3268 Power saving in hard disk drive
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3284 Power saving in printer
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3287 by switching off individual functional units in the computer system
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/10 Program control for peripheral devices G06F13/14 - G06F13/42 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/06 Digital input from, or digital output to, record carriers , e.g. RAID, emulated record carriers or networked record carriers
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0625 Power saving in storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0634 by changing the state or mode of one or more devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0673 Single storage device
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/1221 with regard to power consumption
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/1231 Device related settings, e.g. IP address, Name, Identification
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/1257 by using pre-stored settings, e.g. job templates, presets, print styles
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00 Scanning, transmission or reproduction of documents or the like, e.g. facsimile transmission; Details thereof
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/0027 Reading or writing of non-image information from or to a photographic material, e.g. processing data stored in a magnetic track
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/00896 using a low-power mode, e.g. standby
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 1/21 Intermediate information storage H04N1/387, H04N1/41 take precedence ; for control between transmitter and receiver or between image input and image output device H04N1/32358; indexing, editing G11B27/00
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

An information processing apparatus includes a first storage unit that has a power restricted state and an activated state, and a second storage that has a higher access speed than the first storage. A determination unit determines whether or not the first storage unit needs to be used based on a remaining storage capacity in which data can be stored in the second storage unit. A control unit causes, in a state where data can be stored in the second storage unit, the first storage unit to be in the power restricted state, and makes the first storage unit switch from the power restricted state to the activated state in a case where it is determined, while the first storage unit is in the power restricted state, that the first storage unit needs to be used.

Claims

1. An information processing apparatus comprising:

a non-volatile first storage that can shift to a first power state in which at least write processing can be executed and to a second power state in which power consumption is less than in the first power state and write processing cannot be executed;

a non-volatile second storage that has a higher access speed than the first storage; and

a controller configured to;

confirm a remaining storage capacity in which data can be stored in the second storage, wherein

in a case where the remaining storage capacity is not less than or equal to a threshold, not cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state; and

in a case where the remaining storage capacity is less than or equal to the threshold, not cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state until receiving a data write request, and in accordance with reception of the data write request, cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state and cause a part of data stored in the second storage to be stored in the first storage that has shifted to the first power state.

2. The information processing apparatus according to claim 1,

wherein

in accordance with reception of the data write request, the controller selects a storage destination of data from the first storage unit and the second storage based on a type and a size of the data, and

the controller causes target data of the write request to be stored in the selected storage.

3. The information processing apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the controller selects, as the storage destination of the target data, the second storage unit with priority based on the type and the size of the target data.

4. The information processing apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the controller selects the second storage unit as the storage destination of the target data in a case where the size of the target data is smaller than a predetermined size.

5. The information processing apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the controller selects the second storage unit as the storage destination of the target data in a case where the target data is data set as high-access frequency type data.

6. The information processing apparatus according to claim 5, wherein the high-access frequency type data is set based on a type of a job to be executed in the information processing apparatus.

7. The information processing apparatus according to claim 5, wherein the high-access frequency type data includes data to be used for each execution of a job in the information processing apparatus and setting data of the information processing apparatus.

8. The information processing apparatus according to claim 2, wherein the controller temporarily accumulates data, for which the first storage has been selected as the storage destination, in the second storage while the first storage is in the second power state, causes the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state when an amount of the accumulated data reaches a predetermined amount, and moves the accumulated data from the second storage to the first storage at once.

9. The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein the first storage is an HDD and the second storage is an SSD.

10. The information processing apparatus according to claim 1, wherein, after the information processing apparatus is activated from a power-off state, the second storage is continuously maintained in the first power state.

11. An information processing apparatus comprising:

a non-volatile first storage that can shift to a first power state in which at least write processing can be executed and to a second power state in which power consumption is less than in the first power state and write processing cannot be executed;

a non-volatile second storage that has a higher access speed than the first storage; and

a controller configured to;

in a case where the remaining storage capacity is not less than or equal to a threshold, not cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state; and

in a case where the remaining storage capacity is less than or equal to the threshold, cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state and cause a part of data stored in the second storage to be stored in the first storage that has shifted to the first power state,

wherein the controller decides, among data stored in the second storage, a data candidate to save to the first storage, while the first storage is in the second power state,

the controller causes the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state when the remaining storage capacity becomes less than or equal to a predetermined threshold, copies the decided save candidate data from the second storage to the first storage, and sets a flag to the save candidate data stored in the second storage when performing the copying of the save candidate data, and

the controller deletes the data to which the flag is set from the second storage in accordance with reception of a data write request.

12. The information processing apparatus according to claim 11, wherein the controller decides the save candidate data in accordance with a priority that has been set, on the data stored in the second storage, based on at least one of a data type, a data size, a data access frequency, and an elapsed time since the last access to the data occurred.

13. A control method of an information processing apparatus that has a non-volatile first storage that can shift to a first power state in which at least write processing can be executed and to a second power state in which power consumption is less than in the first power state and write processing cannot be executed, and a non-volatile second storage that has a higher access speed than the first storage, the method comprising:

confirming a remaining storage capacity in which data can be stored in the second storage;

in a case where the remaining storage capacity is not less than or equal to a threshold, not cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state; and

in a case where the remaining storage capacity is less than or equal to the threshold, not cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state until receiving a data write request, and in accordance with reception of the data write request, cause the first storage to shift from the second power state to the first power state and cause a part of data stored in the second storage to be stored in the first storage that has shifted to the first power state.