Patent Application
20080299924
This application is based upon and claims the benefit of priority from Japanese Patent Application No. 2007-145910, filed May 31, 2007, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
1. Field
One embodiment of the present invention relates to an information processor such as a personal computer. More specifically, the present invention relates to an information processor which has a radio antenna unit built-in and a control method for use in the information processor.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, an antenna to be used for a radio communication apparatus or the like generates a power loss caused by the reception state of an electric wave. Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2002-290262 has disclosed a radio communication apparatus which changes the gain limit values into different values corresponding to the power losses of the respective antennas in the use of a first antenna and a second antenna, respectively.
However, since the technique which has been described in Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2002-290262 decides transmission power corresponding to the power loss; the technique produces the problem of not being able to always make the transmission power maximum.
A general architecture that implements the various feature of the invention will now be described with reference to the drawings. The drawings and the associated descriptions are provided to illustrate embodiments of the invention and not to limit the scope of the invention.
Various embodiments according to the invention will be described hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings. In general, according to one embodiment of the invention, an information processor comprising: an information processor includes: a main unit; a display unit configured to be connected to the main unit so as to be rotated; an antenna configured to be built into the display unit; a detection unit configured to detect a state of the display unit; a storage unit configured to store a gain value of the antenna corresponding to the state of the display unit; and a setting unit configured to read to set the gain value of the antenna from the storage unit in response to the state of the display unit detected by the detection unit.
Further, there is provided a control method for use in an information processor equipped with a main unit, a display unit configured to be connected to the main unit so as to be rotated, an antenna configured to be built into the display unit, a detection unit configured to detect a state of the display unit, and a storage unit configured to store a gain value of the antenna corresponding to the display unit, comprising: reading the gain value of the antenna from the storage unit in response to the state of the display unit detected by the detection unit; and setting maximum transmission power of the antenna on the basis of the read gain value of the antenna.
According to the invention, it becomes able to optimally control the transmission power in response to the use state of the antenna.
Hereinafter, embodiments of the invention will be described with reference to the drawings.
Referring now to
The display unit 12 is attached to the computer main unit 11 so as to freely rotate between an open position and a close position of the display unit 12. The computer main unit 11 has a thin box-type housing, a keyboard 13, a power button 14 for powering on/powering off the computer 10, an input operation panel 15, a touch pad 16, loudspeakers 18A, 18B, a infra-red ray reception unit 20 or the like are arranged on the upper surface of the housing.
The input operation panel 15 is an input device to input an event corresponding to the depressed button, and includes a plurality of buttons for starting a plurality of functions, respectively.
Next, the system configuration of the computer 10 will be described by referring to
The computer 10 includes, as shown in
The CPU 101 is a processor for controlling operations of the computer 10, and executes an operating system and various applications to be loaded on the main memory 103 from the HDD 111. The CPU 101 also executes a basic input output system (BIOS) stored on the BIOS-ROM 109. The BIOS is a program for controlling hardware.
The north bridge 102 is a bridge device connecting between a local bus of the CPU 101 and the south bridge 104. The north bridge also has a memory controller to perform access control of the main memory 103 built-in. The north bridge 102 also has a function of making communication with the GPU 105 via a serial bus, etc., conforming to PCI Express standards.
The GPU 105 is a display controller controlling the LCD 17 to be used as a display monitor of the computer 10. A display signal to be generated by the GPU 105 is sent to the LCD 17.
The south bridge 104 controls each device on a low pin count (LPC) bus and each device on a peripheral component interconnect (PCI) bus. The south bridge 104 has an integrated drive electronics (IDE) controller to control the HDD 111.
The IC (EC/KBC) 116 is a one chip microcomputer with an embedded controller for power management and a keyboard controller for controlling the keyboard (KB) 13 and the touch pad 16 integrated thereon. The IC (EC/KBC) 116 has a function of powering on/powering off the computer 10 in response to the operations of the power buttons by a user.
The personal computer 10 includes a control unit 301, a storage unit 205, a detection unit 302, and a transmission and reception unit 303, and the functions which have owned by these units are realized in cooperation with a variety of items of hardware and software.
The control unit 301 sets antenna gain values for the antennas 201, 202 and controls output power therefrom. The table showing the antenna gain values, etc., is stored in the storage unit 205 as given below. The detection unit 302 including the BIOS-RON 109 detects the open/close state of the display unit 12. If the personal computer (PC) is a tablet PC, the detection unit 302 detects a tablet state (a state in which the tablet PC is closed so that the LCD 17 of the display unit 12 is closed) or the like in addition to the state of the closed state or opened state of the display unit 12. The transmission and reception unit 303 is composed of the radio communication module 200, the antennas 201, 202, etc.
A control method which adapts to the information processor regarding the invention will be described by referring to the flowchart of
Firstly, the control method creates the table showing the gain values of the states of the respective antennas and stores the values in the memory 205 (Block S401). The table shows the antenna gain values of a horizontally polarized wave and a vertically polarized wave corresponding to the open/close state of the display unit 12 and the frequency band to be used for the communication. For instance, in the case in which the display unit 12 is an open state as shown in
The detection unit 302 confirms the state of the display unit 12 (Block S402). The PC 10 grasps the state of the display unit 12 from the BIOS-ROM 109, and reports the state to a device driver of the radio communication module 200. It is also acceptable to access the BIOS-ROM 109 from the device driver.
For instance, if the display unit 12 changes its state from the open state to the close state (YES in Block S403), the control unit 301 reads the antenna gain values corresponding to the state of the display unit 12 from the memory 205. The control unit 301 specifies the read antenna gain values and a maximum transmission power value corresponding to a communication system to the baseband circuit 206 (Block S404). The defined values of the maximum power value in response to the state of the display unit 12 and to frequency bands to be used in the communication are stored in the table, as shown in
It is our intention that the invention not be limited to the specific details and representative embodiments shown and described herein, and in an implementation phase, this invention may be embodied in various forms without departing from the spirit or scope of the general inventive concept thereof. Various types of the invention can be formed by appropriately combining a plurality of constituent elements disclosed in the foregoing embodiments. Some of the elements, for example, may be omitted from the whole of the constituent elements shown in the embodiments mentioned above. Further, the constituent elements over different embodiments may be appropriately combined.
The present invention has been achieved in consideration of the aforementioned circumstances; an object of the invention is to provide an information processor configured to optimally control transmission power corresponding to the use state of antennas and a control method of the information processor.
While certain embodiments of the inventions have been described, these embodiments have been presented by way of example only, and are not intended to limit the scope of the inventions. Indeed, the novel methods and systems described herein may be embodied in a variety of other forms; furthermore, various omissions, substitutions and changes in the form of the methods and systems described herein may be made without departing from the spirit of the inventions. The accompanying claims and their equivalents are intended to cover such forms or modifications as would fall within the scope and spirit of the inventions.
| Number | Date | Country | Kind |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2007-145910 | May 2007 | JP | national |
