1. Field of the Invention
The field of the invention is data processing, or, more specifically, methods, apparatus, and products for dynamically managing power consumption of a computer.
2. Description of Related Art
The development of the EDVAC computer system of 1948 is often cited as the beginning of the computer era. Since that time, computer systems have evolved into extremely complicated devices. Today's computers are much more sophisticated than early systems such as the EDVAC. Computer systems typically include a combination of hardware and software components, application programs, operating systems, processors, buses, memory, input/output devices, and so on. As advances in semiconductor processing and computer architecture push the performance of the computer higher and higher, more sophisticated computer software has evolved to take advantage of the higher performance of the hardware, resulting in computer systems today that are much more powerful than just a few years ago.
As computer software advances, hardware requirements for executing such computer software also advance. Increased hardware requirements typically include increased power consumption in computer systems. Consider computer gaming software as one example type of computer software for which hardware requirements and associated power consumption have increased greatly in the recent past. High power consuming graphics adapters capable of meeting graphics processing requirements of computer gaming software continue to consume larger amounts of power than an integrated graphics adapter, or other low-power graphics adapter, even when the computer system is not executing graphics-intensive computer gaming software. Such power consumption during idle, or nearly idle, periods of time, is inefficient and wasteful when alternative, low-power consuming graphic adapters, such as an integrated graphics adapter of a computer motherboard are available in most, if not all, computer systems.
Methods, apparatus, and products for dynamically managing power consumption of a computer, the computer including two or more graphics adapters, each graphics adapter configured to process graphics for display on a computer display, the computer having a number of graphics adapter configurations, each graphics adapter configuration including one or more of the graphics adapters. Dynamically managing power consumption of a computer according to embodiments of the present invention includes: monitoring, by a graphics driver, operation of a current graphics adapter configuration, the monitored operation characterized by a graphics processing load; determining, by the graphics driver in dependence upon the graphics processing load of the current graphics adapter configuration, whether operation of the current graphics adapter configuration conforms to predefined graphics processing criteria; if operation of the current graphics adapter configuration conforms to the predefined graphics processing criteria, processing graphics, by the graphics adapter, for display with the one or more graphics adapters of the current graphics adapter configuration; and if operation of the current graphics adapter configuration does not conform to the predefined graphics processing criteria, processing graphics, by the graphics adapter, for display with the one or more graphics adapters of another graphics adapter configuration.
The foregoing and other objects, features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following more particular descriptions of exemplary embodiments of the invention as illustrated in the accompanying drawings wherein like reference numbers generally represent like parts of exemplary embodiments of the invention.
Exemplary methods, apparatus, and products for dynamically managing power consumption of a computer in accordance with the present invention are described with reference to the accompanying drawings, beginning with
Stored in RAM (168) is an application (126), a module of computer program instructions that carries out user-level data processing tasks. Examples of such applications (126) include video games, spreadsheet applications, work processors, multimedia players, web browsers, and so on as will occur to readers of skill in the art. Also stored in RAM (168) is an operating system (154). Operating systems useful for dynamically managing power consumption of a computer according to embodiments of the present invention include UNIX™, Linux™, Microsoft XP™, AIX™, IBM's i5/OS™, and others as will occur to those of skill in the art.
The operating system (154) in the example of
The example computer (152) of
The example computer (152) is configured with a number of graphics adapter configurations (104). Each graphics adapter configuration (104) identifies one or more of the graphics adapters (207, 209) to activate and use for graphics processing in particular graphics processing-related circumstances, referred to in this specification as predefined graphics processing criteria (106). The predefined graphics processing criteria (106) in the example of
The graphics driver (102), as mentioned above, in addition to enabling higher-level computer program applications to interact with the graphics adapters (207, 209) also operates generally for dynamic power management of the computer (152) in the example of
In some computers for which power consumption is dynamically managed by a graphics adapter according to embodiments of the present invention, the graphics adapters (207, 209) include a graphics adapter integrated with the computer's main motherboard and a graphics adapter installed as a hardware component, a video card, in an expansion slot of the computer, such as Peripheral Component Interconnect (‘PCI’) slot or an Accelerated Graphics Port (‘AGP’) slot. Such integrated graphics adapters typically consume less power than a non-integrated, expansion graphics adapter. The graphics driver (102) then may manage power consumption in such a computer by processing graphics with the low-power consuming integrated graphics adapter when under a low graphics processing load and with the expansion graphics adapter when under a high graphics processing load. That is, the graphics driver manages power, reduces power consumption, by processing graphics with lower-power graphics adapter configurations when the computer is operating under a lower graphics processing load. In other computers in which power consumption is managed by the graphics according to embodiments of the present invention, the graphics adapters installed in the computer (152) may include, in addition to an integrated graphics adapter, a multi-Graphics Processing Unit (‘GPU’) graphics adapter, such as an ATI Technologies Crossfire™ graphics card or an nVidia™ Scalable Link Interface (‘SLI’) graphics card, where each GPU of the graphics card is capable of operating as an individual graphics adapter. That is, each graphics card includes multiple graphics adapters. In such computers in which such multi-GPU graphics card are installed, each GPU may be capable of consuming an equal amount of power. As such, the graphics driver may manage power consumption, reducing such power consumption, by processing graphics with fewer than all GPUs or only the integrated graphics adapter when the computer is operating under a low graphics processing load.
The computer (152) of
In computers of the prior art, the output of each separate graphics adapter installed in a computer enclosure is typically connected to a separate port. Outputs of separate graphics adapters installed in a computer enclosure of the prior art are typically not connected to the same input port of a computer display. In fact, a separate data communications cable typically connects each separate port to an input port on a separate display. That is, one display for each graphics adapter installed in a computer enclosure of the prior art. The outputs of the graphics adapters (207, 209) in the example computer (152) of
The exemplary computer (152) of
The exemplary computer (152) of
The arrangement of servers and other devices making up the exemplary system illustrated in
As mentioned above, in computers of the prior art, the output of each separate graphics adapter installed in a computer enclosure is typically connected to a separate port. In computers for which power consumption is managed dynamically by a graphics driver according to embodiments of the present invention, the outputs of graphics adapters may be configured differently. For further explanation, therefore,
Readers of skill in the art will immediately recognize that connecting multiple graphics adapter outputs to a single computer display (180) input port (202) is just one way among many to connect outputs of multiple graphics adapters to a display of a computer for which power consumption is managed by a graphics driver according to embodiments of the present invention. Another example way in which outputs of multiple graphics adapters to a display of a computer for which power consumption is managed by a graphics driver according to embodiments of the present invention includes connecting the output of each graphics adapter to a separate input of computer display. Computer displays may include multiple input ports such as, for example, a Video Graphics Array (‘VGA’) port, a Digital Visual Interface Port (‘DVI’) port, a DiplayLink™ Universal Serial Bus (‘USB’) port, and so on.
For further explanation,
Upon startup and during initial boot procedures of the computer, the method of
The method of
The method of
If operation of the current graphics adapter configuration conforms to the predefined graphics processing criteria (106), the method of
For further explanation,
For further explanation,
The method of
In the method of
For further explanation,
The method of
In the method of
In view of the explanations set forth above, readers will recognize that the benefits of dynamically managing power consumption of a computer according to embodiments of the present invention include:
Exemplary embodiments of the present invention are described largely in the context of a fully functional computer system for which power consumption is dynamically managing by a graphics driver executing on the computer. Readers of skill in the art will recognize, however, that the present invention also may be embodied in a computer program product disposed on signal bearing media for use with any suitable data processing system. Such signal bearing media may be transmission media or recordable media for machine-readable information, including magnetic media, optical media, or other suitable media. Examples of recordable media include magnetic disks in hard drives or diskettes, compact disks for optical drives, magnetic tape, and others as will occur to those of skill in the art. Examples of transmission media include telephone networks for voice communications and digital data communications networks such as, for example, Ethernets™ and networks that communicate with the Internet Protocol and the World Wide Web as well as wireless transmission media such as, for example, networks implemented according to the IEEE 802.11 family of specifications. Persons skilled in the art will immediately recognize that any computer system having suitable programming means will be capable of executing the steps of the method of the invention as embodied in a program product. Persons skilled in the art will recognize immediately that, although some of the exemplary embodiments described in this specification are oriented to software installed and executing on computer hardware, nevertheless, alternative embodiments implemented as firmware or as hardware are well within the scope of the present invention.
It will be understood from the foregoing description that modifications and changes may be made in various embodiments of the present invention without departing from its true spirit. The descriptions in this specification are for purposes of illustration only and are not to be construed in a limiting sense. The scope of the present invention is limited only by the language of the following claims.
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