Claims
- 1. A battery powered device having one or more receptacles for receiving cards, the battery powered device comprising:
- a power supply that generates battery power;
- a monitoring circuit coupled to the power supply that generates an output signal indicative of an onset of a depletion of the battery power;
- a power control circuit that only attempts to prevent the power supply from delivery battery power to the one or more receptacles in response to the generation of the output signal of the monitoring circuit;
- a processing circuit that receives battery power without interference from the power control circuit even after the generation of the output signal of the monitoring circuit;
- a memory that stores program code that is executable by the processing circuit relating to depletion processing safety measures; and
- the processing circuit couples with the memory to read and execute depletion processing safety measures in response to the generation of the output signal of the monitoring circuit.
- 2. The battery powered device of claim 1 wherein the processing circuit selectively overrides the power control circuit in the attempt to prevent the power supply from delivering battery power to the one or more receptacles.
- 3. The battery powered device of claim 2 wherein the processing circuit makes decisions to override the power control circuit based on characteristics of a card inserted within the receptacle.
- 4. The battery powered device of claim 2 wherein the one or more receptacles comprises one or more PCMCIA card slots.
- 5. The battery powered device of claim 2 wherein the processing circuit selectively overrides the power control circuit after permitting the processing circuit to temporarily prevent the delivery of battery power to the one or more receptacles.
- 6. The battery powered device of claim 1 utilized by a user, wherein the depletion processing safety measures comprises attempting to alert the user.
- 7. The battery powered device of claim 6 wherein the depletion processing safety measures further comprises attempting to save operational information for later recovery.
- 8. The battery powered device of claim 7 wherein the one or more receptacles comprises one or more PCMCIA card slots.
- 9. A battery powered device having one or more receptacles for receiving cards, the battery powered device comprising:
- a power supply that generates battery power;
- a monitoring circuit coupled to the power supply that generates an output signal indicative of an onset of a depletion of the battery power;
- a power control circuit that attempts to prevent the power supply from delivery battery power to the one or more receptacles in response to the generation of the output signal of the monitoring circuit;
- a processing circuit that receives battery power without interference from the power control circuit even after the generation of the output signal of the monitoring circuit; and
- the processing circuit selectively overrides the power control circuit in the attempt to prevent the power supply from delivering battery power to the one or more receptacles.
- 10. The battery powered device of claim 9 utilized by a user, wherein the processing circuit attempts to alert the user in response to the generation of the output signal of the monitoring circuit.
- 11. The battery powered device of claim 10 wherein the processing circuit attempts to save operational information for later recovery.
- 12. The battery powered device of claim 9 wherein the one or more receptacles comprises one or more PCMCIA card slots.
- 13. The battery powered device of claim 9 further comprising:
- a memory that stores program code that is executable by the processing circuit relating to depletion processing safety measures; and
- the processing circuit couples with the memory to read and execute depletion processing safety measures in response to the generation of the output signal of the monitoring circuit.
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application claims priority pursuant to 35 U.S.C. Sec. 119(e) to U.S. Provisional application Ser. No. 60/002,729 (Attorney Docket No. DN38200P1), filed on Aug. 24, 1995. Such provisional application is hereby incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
US Referenced Citations (9)