Apparatus, Systems and Methods For Power Management in Mobile Devices

• US 20160337165A1
• Filed: 05/11/2016
• Published: 11/17/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 05/13/2015
• Status: Active Application

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: GEEYARPURAMNADATHUR, Santhanakrishnan, SAUER, Matthias, Tabet, Tarik, MUJTABA, Syed Aon
• Granted Patent: US 10,271,283 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0251 using monitoring of local events, e.g. events related to user activity
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 52/0261 managing power supply demand, e.g. depending on battery level
• CPC Class Codes: Y02D 30/70 in wireless communication networks

Abstract

An apparatus, system and method for determining whether a battery alarm of a UE is asserted, reducing a transmission duty cycle of the UE to zero for a first predetermined time period when the battery alarm is asserted, determining whether the battery alarm has been de-asserted after the first predetermined time period and when the battery alarm has not been de-asserted, increasing the transmission duty cycle to a first threshold level for a second predetermined time period, wherein the first threshold level is less than a full transmission duty cycle of the UE. When the battery alarm has been de-asserted, increasing the transmission duty cycle to a second threshold level for a third predetermined time period, wherein the second threshold level is less than the full transmission duty cycle of the UE, and wherein the second threshold level is greater than the first threshold level.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

at a user equipment (UE) that communicates with a wireless network via a base station;

determining whether a battery alarm of the UE is asserted;

reducing a transmission duty cycle of the UE to zero for a first predetermined time period when the battery alarm is asserted;

determining whether the battery alarm has been de-asserted after the first predetermined time period; and

when the battery alarm has not been de-asserted, increasing the transmission duty cycle to a first threshold level for a second predetermined time period, wherein the first threshold level is less than a full transmission duty cycle of the UE.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

when the battery alarm has been de-asserted, increasing the transmission duty cycle to a second threshold level for a third predetermined time period, wherein the second threshold level is less than the full transmission duty cycle of the UE, and wherein the second threshold level is greater than the first threshold level.

3. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

after the third predetermined time period, determining whether the battery alarm has been de-asserted;

when the battery alarm has not been de-asserted, reducing the transmission duty cycle of the UE to zero for the first predetermined time period; and

when the battery alarm has been de-asserted, increasing the transmission duty cycle to the full transmission duty cycle.

4. The method of claim 2, further comprising:

when the transmission duty cycle of the UE is set to the first or second threshold level, determining whether a pre-radio link failure (pre-RLF) alarm has been asserted for the UE;

when the pre-RLF alarm is asserted, continuing a current transmission duty cycle of the UE for a fourth predetermined time period and notifying components of the UE of the pre-RLF alarm; and

after the fourth predetermined time period, increasing the transmission duty cycle to the full transmission duty cycle.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

when the pre-RLF alarm is asserted, determining whether the pre-RLF alarm has been de-asserted; and

when the pre-RLF alarm has been de-asserted, decreasing the transmission duty cycle to the first threshold level.

6. The method of claim 2, wherein the first threshold level of the transmission duty cycle is 5-50% of the full transmission duty cycle of the UE and the second threshold level of the transmission duty cycle is 20-75% of the full transmission duty cycle of the UE.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

after the second predetermined time period, determining whether the battery alarm has been de-asserted;

when the battery alarm has not been de-asserted, maintaining the transmission duty cycle of the UE to the first threshold level for the second predetermined time period; and

when the battery alarm has been de-asserted, increasing the transmission duty cycle to the second threshold level for the third predetermined time period.

8. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

determining a number of missing uplink events, wherein the missing uplink events are events that the base station is scheduled to receive from the UE in an uplink, but are not received by the base station; and

when the number of missing uplink events meets a pre-radio link failure (“

pre-RLF”

) threshold, asserting a pre-RLF alarm.

9. The method of claim 8, further comprising:

when the pre-RLF alarm is asserted, determining whether the wireless network is aware that the UE is currently connected to the base station; and

when it is determined the wireless network is aware the UE is currently connected to the base station, de-asserting the pre-RLF alarm.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the determining whether the wireless network is aware that the UE is currently connected to the base station includes one of:

receiving an acknowledgement (“

ACK”

) from the base station;

or sending a measurement report to the base station.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the battery alarm is a pre-undervoltage lockout (“

pre-UVLO”

) alarm that indicates a battery voltage has dropped below a predetermined battery voltage threshold.

12. The method of claim 1, wherein the base station is an evolved Node B (“

eNB”

) and the wireless network is a Long Term Evolution (“

LTE”

) network or an LTE-Advanced network.

13. A user equipment (“

UE”

), comprising;

a battery;

a power management component that monitors the battery and asserts a battery alarm; and

a baseband processor that controls a transmission duty cycle of the UE, wherein the baseband processor reduces a transmission duty cycle of the UE to zero for a first predetermined time period when the battery alarm is asserted and wherein, after the first predetermined time period, the baseband processor further increases the transmission duty cycle to a first threshold level for a second predetermined time period when the battery alarm continues to be asserted and increases the transmission duty cycle to a second threshold level for a third predetermined time period when the battery alarm has been de-asserted.

14. The UE of claim 13, wherein the first and second threshold levels are less than the full transmission duty cycle of the UE, and wherein the second threshold level is greater than the first threshold level.

15. The UE of claim 13, wherein, after the third predetermined time period, the baseband processor reduces the transmission duty cycle of the UE to zero for the first predetermined time period when the battery alarm has not been de-asserted or increases the transmission duty cycle to the full transmission duty cycle when the battery alarm has been de-asserted.

16. The UE of claim 13, wherein the baseband processor further monitors an uplink with which the UE is connected to a wireless network and asserts a pre-radio link failure (“

pre-RLF”

) alarm based on uplink events.

17. The UE of claim 16, further comprising:

additional components, wherein the baseband processor notifies the additional components of the UE of the pre-RLF alarm and wherein the additional components reduce a power consumption based on the receipt of the notification of the pre-RLF alarm.

18. The UE of claim 13, wherein, after the second predetermined time period, the baseband processor maintains the transmission duty cycle of the UE to the first threshold level for the second predetermined time period when the battery alarm has not been de-asserted, or increases the transmission duty cycle to the second threshold level for the third predetermined time period when the battery alarm has been de-asserted.

20. The baseband processor of claim 17, further comprising:

circuitry configured to monitor an uplink with which the UE is connected to a wireless network and assert a pre-radio link failure (“

pre-RLF”

) alarm based on uplink events; and

a general purpose output sending an indication to other components of the UE that the pre-RLF alarm has been asserted.

19. A baseband processor of a user equipment (“

UE”

), comprising;

a general purpose input receiving an indication that a battery alarm has been asserted for the UE; and

circuitry configured to control a transmission duty cycle of the UE, wherein the circuitry reduces a transmission duty cycle of the UE to zero for a first predetermined time period when the battery alarm is asserted and wherein, after the first predetermined time period, the circuitry further increases the transmission duty cycle to a first threshold level for a second predetermined time period when the battery alarm continues to be asserted and increases the transmission duty cycle to a second threshold level for a third predetermined time period when the battery alarm has been de-asserted.