The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Apr. 04, 1995
Filed:
Feb. 16, 1993
Gregory N Stewart, Austin, TX (US);
Dell USA, Austin, TX (US);
Abstract
Method and apparatus for effecting BIOS independent power management of a personal computer system having a processor complex connected via a system bus to at least one I/O device capable of operating in a reduced power consumption state. A power control system comprising a dedicated power management microcontroller monitors the activity of various I/O devices. When a particular device or combination of devices has remained inactive for the preselected time interval, the power control system issues a bus request to a processor complex. When the processor complex acknowledges the bus request, the power control system asserts control as master of the system bus and performs the operations necessary to cause at least one device to enter a reduced power consumption state. The power control system then surrenders control of the bus to the processor complex. In one aspect, a CPU clock controller is utilized to reduce the processing speed of the processor complex CPU.