PORTABLE DEVICE WITH PRIORITY BASED POWER SAVINGS CONTROL AND METHOD THEREOF

• US 20080057894A1
• Filed: 08/31/2006
• Published: 03/06/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 08/31/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qualcomm, Inc.
• Original Assignee: ATI Technologies Incorporated (Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.)
• Inventors: Aleksic, Milivoje, Balatsos, Aris, O'Neil, Kevin, Esliger, James L., Plotnick, Bruce
• Granted Patent: US 8,135,443 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/187.1
• CPC Class Codes: H02J 9/002 in which a reserve is maintained in an energy source by disconnecting non-critical loads, e.g. maintaining a reserve of charge in a vehicle battery for starting an engine
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0258 controlling an operation mode according to history or models of usage information, e.g. activity schedule or time of day
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0277 according to available power supply, e.g. switching off when a low battery condition is detected
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

A portable device includes a controller that is responsive to a remaining power capacity of the battery, and a power consumption level of the portable device and based on user prioritized functional processing capability features, dynamically controls functional processing capability features of the device. The controller provides power for a higher priority feature at the expense of a lower priority functional processing capability feature consistent with the user prioritized functional processing capability features. A wireless portable device is also disclosed that includes a wireless signal strength determinator that determines a received signal strength of the wireless device and a controller that adjusts the functional processing capability feature of the wireless device based on the determined received signal strength and based on battery capacity information. In this way, received signal strength information is used as a further input to determine how to best adjust functional processing capability features of the device.

Claims

1. A portable device comprising:

a battery;

a controller, operatively coupled to the battery, and responsive to (i) a remaining power capacity of a battery and (ii) a power consumption rate of the portable device and based on prioritized functional processing capability features of the portable device, dynamically control functional processing capability features of the device to provide power for a higher priority feature at the expense of a lower priority functional processing capability feature consistent with the prioritized functional processing capability features.

2. The portable device of claim 1 wherein the data representing user prioritized features comprises data representing a talk time threshold and wherein the controller is operative to dynamically control functional processing capability features of the device to provide power for a voice communication feature at the expense of a lower priority feature consistent with the talk time threshold as a power capacity of the battery decreases.

3. The portable device of claim 1 comprising a user interface operative to provide selectable functional processing capability feature priority data and to provide selected feature priority data to the memory for storage as the data representing prioritized functional processing capability features.

4. The portable device of claim 1 wherein the controller is also operative to dynamically control operation of the device to provide power for a higher priority functional processing capability feature at the expense of a lower priority feature consistent with the data representing user prioritized features as a power capacity of the battery decreases based on received signal strength information.

5. A wireless portable device comprising:

a wireless signal strength determinator operative to determine a received signal strength of the portable device; and

a controller, operatively coupled to the wireless signal strength determinator, and operative to adjust a functional processing capability feature of the wireless portable device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

6. The wireless device of claim 5 wherein the controller adjusts the functional processing capability feature of the device by controlling, at an application level, operation of an application operating on the device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

7. The wireless device of claim 5 comprising:

a battery; and

a battery capacity determinator operatively coupled to the battery and operative to generate the battery capacity information based on a remaining battery capacity of the battery.

8. The wireless device of claim 5 wherein the controller adjusts the functional processing capability features of the device by selecting which application will operate on the device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

9. The wireless device of claim 5 comprising a user interface operative to provide a user settable talk time threshold and wherein the controller is operative to set the functional processing capability feature based on the user settable talk time threshold to reduce functional processing capability feature to preserve a desired talk time indicated by the user settable talk time threshold.

10. The wireless device of claim 5 wherein the controller is operative to determine an amount of power that will be used to provide a functional processing capability feature and is operative to reduce processing capability features to preserve power for an emergency call.

11. The wireless device of claim 10 wherein the controller is operative to shut down functional processing capability features of the wireless device to reduce power consumption to preserve power for the emergency call.

12. The wireless device of claim 5 comprising memory, operatively coupled to the controller, that stores data representing functional processing capability feature setting data.

13. The wireless device of claim 11 wherein the controller reduces display capability of the wireless device when in an emergency call mode.

14. A portable device comprising:

a wireless signal strength determinator operative to determine a received signal strength of the wireless device; and

a controller, operatively coupled to the wireless signal strength determinator, operative to adjust a functional processing capability feature of the wireless device based on the determined received signal strength, battery capacity information and network congestion information.

15. The wireless device of claim 14 comprising a wireless receiver operative to receive the network congestion information from a wireless network communication signal.

16. The wireless device of claim 14 wherein the controller adjusts the functional processing capability feature of the device by controlling, at an application level, operation of an application operating on the device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

17. The wireless device of claim 14 comprising:

a battery; and

a battery capacity determinator operatively coupled to the battery and operative to generate the battery capacity information based on a remaining battery capacity of the battery.

18. The wireless device of claim 14 wherein the controller is operative to adjust the functional processing capability feature of the device by selecting which application will operate on the device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

19. The wireless device of claim 14 comprising a user interface operative to provide a user settable talk time threshold and wherein the controller is operative to set the functional processing capability feature based on the user settable talk time threshold to preserve a desired talk time indicated by the user settable talk time threshold.

20. The wireless device of claim 14 wherein the controller is operative to determine an amount of power that will be used to provide a functional processing capability feature and is operative to enter an emergency call mode prior to an out of power condition, to preserve power for an emergency call.

21. The wireless device of claim 20 wherein the controller is operative to shut down functional processing capability features of the wireless device to reduce power consumption to preserve power for the emergency call.

22. The wireless device of claim 14 comprising memory, operatively coupled to the controller, that stores data representing functional processing capability feature setting data.

23. The wireless device of claim 21 wherein the controller reduces display capability of the wireless device when in an emergency call mode.

24. A method comprising:

obtaining data representing user prioritized functional processing capability feature; and

based on user prioritized functional processing capability features of a portable device and in response to a remaining power capacity of a battery in the device and a power consumption rate of the portable device, dynamically controlling operation of device to provide power for a higher priority functional processing capability feature at the expense of a lower priority functional processing capability feature consistent with the user prioritized functional processing capability features.

25. The method of claim 24 wherein the user prioritized functional processing capability features comprises data representing a talk time threshold and wherein the method includes dynamically controlling operation of the device to provide power for a higher priority functional processing capability feature at the expense of a lower priority functional processing capability feature consistent with the talk time threshold as a power capacity of the battery decreases.

26. The method of claim 24 comprising providing selectable functional processing capability feature priority data and storing data in memory representing selected user prioritized functional processing capability features.

27. The method of claim 24 wherein dynamically controlling operation of the device to provide power for a higher priority functional processing capability feature at the expense of a lower priority feature consistent with the data representing user prioritized functional processing capability features as a power capacity of the battery decreases is also done based on received signal strength information.

28. A method comprising:

determining a received signal strength for a portable device; and

adjusting a functional processing capability feature of the portable device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

29. The method of claim 28 comprising adjusting the functional processing capability feature of the device by controlling, at an application level, operation of an application operating on the device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

30. The method of claim 28 wherein adjusting the functional processing capability features of the device comprises selecting which application will operate on the device based on the determined received signal strength and battery capacity information.

31. The method of claim 28 comprising using a user settable talk time threshold and setting the functional processing capability feature based on the user settable talk time threshold to in an effort to preserve a desired talk time indicated by the user settable talk time threshold.

32. The method of claim 28 comprising determining an amount of power that will be used to provide a functional processing capability feature and is operative to reduce processing capability features to preserve power for an emergency call.

33. The method of claim 28 comprising shutting down functional processing capability features of the wireless device to reduce power consumption to preserve power for the emergency call.

34. The method of claim 32 comprising reducing display capability of the wireless device when in the emergency call mode.

35. The method of claim 28 further comprising adjusting a functional processing capability feature of the portable device based on network congestion information.

36. The method of claim 35 comprising causing the portable device to enter a reduced power mode in response to the network congestion information indicating a decrease in network congestion.

37. The method of claim 35 comprising determining if the network congestion information indicates a network congestion level at or beyond a desired high level threshold and if so, increasing signal transmit power of the portable device and reducing power consumption caused by other features, to partly offset the additional power consumption caused by the increase in transmit power.

38. The method of claim 35 comprising determining if the network congestion information indicates a network congestion level at or beyond a desired high level threshold and if so, repeating a sending of packets at a current power level.

39. The method of claim 28 comprising determining a power usage rate of the device based on a current operational condition of the device, predicting an amount of time that an application can continue to run based on the power usage rate;

determine whether a desired application quality of service level can be maintained for a desired application run-time;

if so, adjusting power consumption of the device and a quality of service level provided by the application in an attempt to meet the desired application run-time.

40. The method of claim 39 wherein adjusting power consumption of the device and a quality of service level provided by the application in an attempt to meet the desired application run-time comprises shutting down the application to maintain a minimum battery power energy reserve.