Windows-driven power management for peripheral devices in a computer system

• US 20050120256A1
• Filed: 11/08/2004
• Published: 06/02/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 11/20/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Acer, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Acer, Inc.
• Inventors: Lu, De-Jen
• Granted Patent: US 7,334,138 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 713/324
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3215 Monitoring of peripheral devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3218 of display devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3221 of disk drive devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/325 Power saving in peripheral device
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3265 Power saving in display device
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3268 Power saving in hard disk drive
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 1/3287 by switching off individual functional units in the computer system
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 10/00 Energy efficient computing, e.g. low power processors, power management or thermal management

Abstract

An apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer includes at least one peripheral device, a power management unit, and a memory unit. The power management unit includes a daemon program and a device idle time table. The daemon program is used for carrying out a first criterion by determining whether the power supplied to the device is associated with an active application program of the computer based on the device idle time table, and carrying out a second criterion by determining whether the power supplied to the device is associated with the inactive application programs of the computer based on the device idle time table. A power-saving signal is sent to an operating system of the computer when both criteria are satisfied, and the operating system activates an embedded power management utility to turn off the peripheral device in response to the power-saving signal.

Claims

1. An apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer, comprising:

at least one peripheral device;

a memory unit; and

a power management unit comprising a device idle time table for recording the average idle time of each peripheral device with respect to each application program in the computer, and a daemon program being launched and loaded in the memory unit for carrying out a first criterion by determining whether the power supplied to a peripheral device is associated with an active application program running on said computer based on the statistical data of said device idle time table, and carrying out a second criterion by determining whether the power supplied to said peripheral device is associated with the inactive application programs running on said computer based on the statistical data of said device idle time table, and, wherein a power-saving signal is sent to an operating system of the computer when both of said first criterion and said second criterion are satisfied, and in response to said power-saving signal, said operating system powers off said peripheral device.

2. The apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 1 wherein said first criterion is satisfied when the utilization of said peripheral device with respect to an active application program is zero.

3. The apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 1 wherein said second criterion is satisfied when a minimum of average idle times of said peripheral device with respect to said inactive application programs is longer than the break-even time of said peripheral device.

4. The apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 1 wherein said peripheral device is an input/output device.

5. The apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 1 wherein said input/output device is a network interface card.

6. The apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 5 wherein said peripheral device is a data storage device.

7. The apparatus for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 6 wherein said data storage device is a hard disk.

8. A method for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer, comprising steps of:

carrying out a first criterion by determining whether the power supplied to a peripheral device is associated with an active application program running in said computer;

carrying out a second criterion by determining whether the power supplied to said peripheral device is associated with the inactive application programs running in said computer;

sending a power-saving signal to an operating system of said computer unit when both of said first criterion and said second criterion are satisfied; and

in response to said power-saving signal, powering off said peripheral device.

9. The method for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 8 wherein said first criterion is satisfied when the utilization of said peripheral device with respect to said active application program is zero.

10. The method for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 8 wherein said second criterion is satisfied when a minimum of average idle times of said peripheral device with respect to said inactive application programs is longer than the break-even time of said peripheral device.

11. The method for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 8 wherein said peripheral device is an input/output device.

12. The method for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 11 wherein said input/output device is a network interface card.

13. The method for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 8 wherein said peripheral device is a data storage device.

14. The method for dynamically managing the power consumption of peripheral devices in a computer according to claim 13 wherein said data storage device is a hard disk.