Power management architecture for computing devices

Abstract

A method and power management infrastructure are disclosed that facilitate implementing application power requirements-derived device power state schemes, on a computing device comprising a plurality of component devices managed by device drivers that are capable of requesting lower power states without affecting other component device power states. The disclosed power management framework includes a set of global power state definitions specifying, for each global power state, default power states for the component devices. The infrastructure also includes a power manager. The power manager includes an application interface including a function for registering device-specific requirements associated with particular applications executing on the computing device. The power manager also includes a device power state set function facilitating issuing a device-specific command setting a power state of a specified component device. The power manager executes decision logic for detecting that the power state requirement for a device exceeds a current power state, and in response invokes the device power state set function to set the component device's power state to the required power state.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.