Electronic devices and method of controlling an electronic device

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016239057-A1
Application number	US-201514623574-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Feb 17, 2015
Priority date	Feb 17, 2015
Publication date	Aug 18, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

An electronic device is provided. The electronic device may include a plurality of electronic circuits comprising a first electronic circuit and a second electronic circuit; and a processor configured to control at least one of the first electronic circuit or the second electronic circuit depending on at least one parameter indicating thermal properties of the first electronic circuit and a predetermined parameter indicating a thermal interdependency between the first electronic circuit and the second electronic circuit.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1 . An electronic device, comprising:
a plurality of electronic circuits comprising a first electronic circuit and a second electronic circuit; and a processor configured to control at least one of the first electronic circuit or the second electronic circuit depending on at least one parameter indicating thermal properties of the first electronic circuit and a predetermined parameter indicating a thermal interdependency between the first electronic circuit and the second electronic circuit.

2 . The electronic device of claim 1 ,
wherein the processor is further configured to control at least one of the first electronic circuit or the second electronic circuit depending on at least one parameter indicating thermal properties of the second electronic circuit.

3 . The electronic device of claim 1 ,
wherein the first electronic circuit comprises the processor.

4 . The electronic device of claim 1 , further comprising:
at least one temperature sensor to measure the temperature of at least a portion of at least one of the first electronic circuit or the second electronic circuit

5 . The electronic device of claim 1 ,
wherein the processor is configured to control the second electronic circuit depending on at least one parameter indicating thermal properties of the first electronic circuit.

6 . The electronic device of claim 1 ,
wherein the processor is configured to control the first electronic circuit to vary the performance of the first electronic circuit.

7 . The electronic device of claim 1 , further comprising:
a memory configured to store information about thermal properties of the first electronic circuit, thermal properties of the second electronic circuit and thermal interdependency between the first electronic circuit and the second electronic circuit.

8 . The electronic device of claim 7 ,
wherein the memory is configured to store information about thermal properties of each electronic circuit of the plurality of electronic circuits.

9 . The electronic device of claim 7 ,
wherein the memory is configured to store information about thermal interdependencies between all the electronic circuits of the plurality of electronic circuits.

10 . An electronic device, comprising:
a plurality of electronic circuits; a processor configured to control at least one electronic circuit of the plurality of electronic circuits depending on a determined temperature of at least one further electronic circuit of the plurality of electronic circuits and the thermal interaction of the at least one electronic circuit with the at least one further electronic circuit.

11 . The electronic device of claim 10 ,
wherein the processor is configured to control the at least one electronic circuit to vary the performance of the at least one electronic circuit.

12 . The electronic device of claim 10 , further comprising:
a memory configured to store information about thermal properties of the at least one electronic circuit, thermal properties of the at least one further electronic circuit and thermal interaction between the at least one electronic circuit and the at least one further electronic circuit.

13 . The electronic device of claim 12 ,
wherein the memory is configured to store information about thermal interdependencies between all the electronic circuits of the plurality of electronic circuits.

14 . The electronic device of claim 10 ,
wherein the memory is further configured to store, for at least the at least one electronic circuit, an electronic circuit throttling scheme including instructions to change the functionality of the at least one electronic circuit, to thereby change the power consumption of the at least one electronic circuit.

15 . The electronic device of claim 14 ,
wherein the memory is further configured to store, for each electronic circuit of the plurality of electronic circuits, a respective electronic circuit throttling scheme including instructions to change the functionality of the respective electronic circuit, to thereby change the power consumption of the respective electronic circuit.

16 . The electronic device of claim 15 ,
wherein the memory is configured to store information about thermal properties of each electronic circuit of the plurality of electronic circuits; wherein the memory is configured to store information about thermal interactions between all the electronic circuits of the plurality of electronic circuits; wherein the processor is further configured to
determine a temperature of at least a part of the electronic device;
determine a cooling scheme based on the
stored information about thermal properties of each electronic circuit of the plurality of electronic circuits;
stored information about thermal interdependencies between all the electronic circuits of the plurality of electronic circuits; and
the stored plurality of electronic circuit throttling schemes;

control the at least one electronic circuit in accordance with the determined cooling scheme based on the determined temperature of at least a part of the electronic device.

17 . An electronic device, comprising:
a plurality of chip modules; a memory configured to store information about self-heating of each chip module of the plurality of chip modules and information about cross-heating of the chip modules indicating the temperature influence of a respective chip module to one or more other chip modules; a processor configured to control the temperature of at least one chip module based on the stored information about self-heating of the at least one chip module and the stored information about cross-heating of the chip modules.

18 . The electronic device of claim 17 ,
wherein the processor is further configured to control the temperature of the at least one chip module based on the stored information about self-heating of at least one other chip module of the plurality of chip modules.

19 . The electronic device of claim 17 ,
wherein the processor is configured to control the temperature of the at least one chip module by varying the performance of the at least one chip module.

20 . The electronic device of claim 17 ,
wherein the memory is further configured to store, for each chip module of the plurality of chip modules, a respective chip module throttling scheme including instructions to change the functionality of the respective chip module, to thereby change the power consumption of the respective chip module.

Assignees

• Intel Ip Corp

Inventors

• Kocagoez Kenan

Classifications

• G06F1/3246

  by software initiated power-off · CPC title

• G06F1/206 Primary

  comprising thermal management · CPC title

• G06F11/3024

  where the computing system component is a central processing unit [CPU] · CPC title

• G06F1/3287

  by switching off individual functional units in the computer system · CPC title

• G06F11/3058

  Monitoring arrangements for monitoring environmental properties or parameters of the computing system or of the computing system component, e.g. monitoring of power, currents, temperature, humidity, position, vibrations (thermal management in cooling arrangements of a computing system G06F1/206) · CPC title