Maintaining Network Services Across Multiple Physical Interfaces

A method comprising:

• receiving configuration information regarding network services available in a low power state of a system;
• storing the configuration information in a non-volatile memory accessible by a manageability engine (ME) of the system in the low power state, the ME including a generic processing engine to execute a generic port filter to filter packets received from a plurality of disparate network devices including a memory, a graphics unit, a wireless local area network (WLAN) device, an input/output controller including a media access control (MAC) unit of an Ethernet network interface, and at least one wired device to be a network interconnect to an Ethernet network;
• and
• receiving a packet in the ME from a MAC unit of one of the plurality of disparate network devices of the system coupled to the ME via a physical interconnect while the system is in the low power state and accessing the non-volatile memory to determine how to handle the packet.

A system comprising:

• a central processing unit (CPU) to execute instructions;
• a chipset coupled to the CPU, the chipset to remain enabled during a low power mode of the system, the chipset including a manageability engine having media access control (MAC) functionality for handling incoming packets of different packet types and from a plurality of physical devices, the manageability engine to execute a generic port filter to filter the incoming packets received from the plurality of physical devices;
• a memory coupled to the chipset by a first physical interconnect, the memory corresponding to a first one of the plurality of physical devices;
• a graphics unit coupled to the chipset by a second physical interconnect, the graphics unit corresponding to a second one of the plurality of physical devices;
• an input/output controller coupled to the chipset by a third physical interconnect, the input/output controller including a MAC unit of an Ethernet network interface and corresponding to a third one of the plurality of physical devices;
• wherein each of the plurality of physical devices each include a physical (PHY) unit to receive the incoming packets and forward the incoming packets to the chipset while the system is in the low power mode, and at least one of the plurality of physical devices does not include a port filter.