Patent Application
20160071480
1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an electronic device, and, in particular, to a low-power optimization mechanism in an electronic device including different control systems.
2. Description of the Related Art
With recent advances in technology, mobile devices have become more and more popular. Currently, the screen on a mobile device such as a smartphone, a tablet PC, or a smart watch can be turned off to save power. However, the user has to manually turn the screen on before checking information or using applications on the mobile device. Accordingly, it is inconvenient and power-consuming to awaken the whole mobile device to a working mode if the user only wants to check some simple information, e.g. time, or use a simple application, e.g. viewing text messages or a calendar.
Accordingly, there is demand for an electronic device and an associated low-power optimization method to solve the aforementioned problem.
A detailed description is given in the following embodiments with reference to the accompanying drawings.
An electronic device is provided. The electronic device includes a display unit, a first control system, and a second control system. The display unit includes a first display area and a second display area. The first control system and the second control system control displaying of the first display area and the second display area, respectively. Activation of the first control system and the second control system is based on a hardware configuration of the electronic device. The first display area is larger than the second display area, and the second control system has lower active power than the first control system.
A low-power optimization method for an electronic device is provided. The electronic device comprises a display unit, a first control system, and a second control system. The method includes the steps of: utilizing the first control system and the second control system to control displaying of a first display area and a second display area of the display unit, respectively; controlling activation of the first control system and the second control system based on a hardware configuration of the electronic device, wherein the first display area is larger than the second display area, and the second control system has lower active power than the first control system.
The invention can be more fully understood by reading the subsequent detailed description and examples with references made to the accompanying drawings, wherein:
The following description is made for the purpose of illustrating the general principles of the invention and should not be taken in a limiting sense. The scope of the invention is best determined by reference to the appended claims.
In this embodiment, the first control system 110 comprises a processor 111, an infrastructure 112, an memory interface circuit 113, a display controller 114, a memory unit 130, and a first display panel 140. The processor 111 may be a central processing unit (CPU), a digital signal processor (DSP), or the like. The infrastructure 112 is an intermediary (e.g. a system bus and/or an interface circuit) communicating between the processor 111, the memory interface circuit 113, the display controller 114 and the second control system 120. The memory interface circuit 113 provides a memory interface communicating between the processor 111 and the memory unit 130. The memory unit 130 is connected to the processor 111 through the memory interface circuit 113. In some embodiments, the memory interface circuit 113 can be omitted, and the memory unit 130 is directly connected to the processor 111 through the infrastructure 112. The display controller 114 is configured to control the display timing and generate the display data to the first display panel 140.
For example, the memory unit 130 may comprise a non-volatile memory and a volatile memory, e.g. DRAM (not shown in
The first display panel 140 is connected to the first control system 110 through the display controller 114. The first display panel 140, for example, can be implemented by liquid crystal display (LCD), light-emitting diode (LED), or organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technologies, but the invention is not limited thereto. The processor 111 may display a first user interface on the first display panel 140 through the display controller 114.
The second control system 120 comprises a controller 121, a peripheral interface 122, a display controller 123, a memory unit 124, a plurality of sensors 150, and a second display panel 160. For example, the memory unit 124 may be a volatile memory such as an SRAM or a tightly-coupled memory. The memory unit 124 may be applied as a main memory for the controller 121 for executing software routines and other selective storage functions. The controller 121, for example, may be a processor or a microcontroller.
The sensors 150, for example, comprise at least one of a pedometer (e.g. accelerometer and gyroscope), an ambient light sensor, a proximity sensor, and the like. The sensors 150 are connected to the processor 121 through the peripheral interface 122 such as SPI, UART, or SDIO interface. In addition, other types of peripheral devices can also be connected to the processor 121 through the peripheral interface 122, such as a touch control module, a speaker, etc. In addition, the second display panel 160 is connected to the processor 121 through the display controller 123. In an embodiment, the second display panel 160 is an ultra-low-power display panel such as an E-ink panel or an OLED panel, but the invention is not limited thereto.
In an embodiment, the components 111˜114 of the first control system 110 can be regarded as an application (AP) system 170, and are integrated into a single chip. The components 121˜124 of the second control system 120 can be regarded as a microcontroller (MCU) system 180, and are also integrated into another chip. In an alternative embodiment, the components of the AP system and the MCU system can be integrated into a system-on-chip (SoC) 190.
In an embodiment, when the first control system 110 enters a sleep mode, power to the components (e.g. 111˜114) of the first control system 110 may also be turned off to save power. Meanwhile, the second control system 120 and the components (e.g. sensors 150, and the second display panel 160) connected to the second control system 120 are still running, and the user may still control the electronic device 100, e.g. by tapping on the icons of the user interface displayed on the second display panel 160, or by performing a predetermined gesture or touch action, e.g. double tap, on the second display panel 160. Since the second display panel 160 is an ultra-low-power display panel with very low active power, the overall power consumption of the electronic device can be significantly reduced when the first control system 110 enters the sleep mode. The memory unit 130 and the first display panel 140 are deactivated. If the user only wants to use a simple function, e.g. viewing current time or text messages, or making a phone call, the second control system 120 could handle the operation without awakening all the components of the first control system 110.
In an embodiment, the first control system 110 can be awakened to the working mode from the sleep mode by the second control system 120. For example, the user may tap on the icons 221˜222 of the user interface, e.g. the “smart bar” shown in
In an embodiment, the first display panel 140 and the second display panel 160 are integrated into a single display panel, and the first control system 110 and the second control system 120 control a first display area and a second display area of the display panel of the electronic device 100, respectively. Specifically, the first display area of the display panel provides a colorful display environment as a user interface for the rich applications running on the processor 111, and has higher active power. The second display area of the display panel provides a relatively simple display environment as a user interface for the applications running on the processor 121, and has a lower active power. In addition, the area of the first display area is much larger than that of the second display area, as shown in
Alternatively, the electronic device 100 can be used as a smart watch, as shown in
Alternatively, the electronic device 100 can be used as a smartphone, as shown in
The virtual battery management software 420 is configured to define the power-budget allocation of each subsystem, and the power management unit 430 may manage power control of each subsystem based on the allocated power budget defined by the virtual battery management software 420. For example, the virtual battery management software 420 may retrieve the power consumption information from the power management unit 430 and the hardware subsystems 410. Afterwards, the virtual battery management software 420 may estimate the remaining battery level of each virtual battery and the physical battery based on the power consumption information, and send the estimated remaining battery level of each virtual battery to the power management unit 430, so that the power management unit 430 may update the information of the allocated power budget of each subsystem.
In addition, the components in the first control system 110 and the second control system 120 can be further divided into a plurality of subsystems depending on the configurations in the embodiments of
In this embodiment, a virtual battery is a logical construct on the electronic device 100 that powers a defined set of applications and has a defined power budget from one or more physical batteries on the electronic device 100. The processors 111 and 121 may execute virtual battery management software 420 which is pre-stored in a non-volatile memory (not shown in
In an embodiment, the classifications of the subsystems may also be defined by application usage and/or hardware usage. Alternatively, applications or software processes executed by the processors 111 and 121 may span different subsystems. Specifically, the configuration of the subsystems and the capacity of the virtual batteries can be preset based on the usage of the electronic device 100 and/or the type of the electronic device 100. For example, when the electronic device 100 is a wearable device such as a smart watch, the watch subsystem and the pedometer subsystem, which are mainly focused by the user. Accordingly, the virtual battery management software may allocate greater power budget, i.e. higher capacity of the virtual battery, for the watch subsystem and the pedometer system, thereby guaranteeing a longer usage time of the watch subsystem and the pedometer subsystem.
Each subsystem has individual virtual battery, i.e. power budget, and different daily of use (DoU). The virtual battery of each subsystem is independent from each other, and each subsystem acts as if it has its own battery. Although the subsystems share the same battery in the battery module 440, the virtual battery management software may allocate an individual virtual battery for each of the subsystems. Specifically, the virtual battery management software may allocate different power budget for each subsystem and estimate the remaining battery capacity in each virtual battery based on the feedback information from the power management unit 430 and the subsystems 410.
Generally, the power budget of the application subsystem is much greater than that of other subsystems since the power consumption of the application subsystem, e.g. smartphone subsystem, is extremely huge when compared with other subsystems. However, the sustainability of the connectivity subsystem and the watch subsystem is more important for a user in some situations. For example, given that the electronic device 100 is a wearable device, a user may want to keep the watch/clock function or the pedometer function alive as long as possible even when the virtual battery of the application subsystem is exhausted. Alternatively, the electronic device 100 should be ready whenever the user wants to make a phone call or receive emails or messages. That is, the modem and connectivity subsystems should be alive as long as possible in this case.
Specifically, referring to
In an embodiment, the second control system 120 is capable of performing an electronic ticket application. Since the second control system 120 is an ultra-low-power execution environment for running applications, the second control system 120 is still capable of executing the electronic ticket application and showing the electronic ticket on the second display panel 160 when the battery level of the virtual battery for the second control system 120 is low.
In view of the above, an electronic device and associated low-power optimization method are provided. The electronic device and the associated low-power optimization method are capable of activating different control systems based on hardware configurations of the electronic device, so that the usage mode of the electronic device (e.g. smartphone, feature phone, or smart watch) can be alternated with different hardware configurations.
While the invention has been described by way of example and in terms of the preferred embodiments, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the disclosed embodiments. On the contrary, it is intended to cover various modifications and similar arrangements (as would be apparent to those skilled in the art). Therefore, the scope of the appended claims should be accorded the broadest interpretation so as to encompass all such modifications and similar arrangements.
This application is a Continuation-In-Part of application Ser. No. 14/478,116, filed on Sep. 5, 2014 and entitled “VIRTUAL BATTERIES FOR ELECTRONIC DEVICE AND ASSOCIATED METHOD”, and also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/053,470, filed on Sep. 22, 2014, the entirety of which are incorporated by reference herein.
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 62053470 | Sep 2014 | US |
| Number | Date | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Parent | 14478116 | Sep 2014 | US |
| Child | 14700578 | US |
