8372 results about "Power usage" patented technology

The invention generally concerns systems and methods for monitoring and controlling the power consumption of a power-consuming device. The system and method may connect to a power source and a power-consuming device, connecting the power-consuming device to the power source. The power usage of the power-consuming device may then be measured and monitored. This monitoring data may then be stored and optionally sent to a controlling device on a data network. The location of the power-consuming device may also be determined, recorded, and sent to a controlling device. The system may also control the power usage of the power-consuming device. In some cases, a remote server may connect multiple energy monitoring systems in order to gain additional efficiencies and foster a community-based social network.

Methods and devices for effecting a gastric restriction system are disclosed. In one exemplary embodiment, a restriction system for forming a restriction in a patient is provided and can include an implantable restriction device and at least one implantable sensor that is in communication with the restriction device. In general, the implantable restriction device can be adjustable and can be configured to form a restriction in a patient. The implantable sensor(s) can be defaulted to a dormant power usage mode and can have a triggering mechanism that is configured to place the sensor(s) in a use configuration upon the occurrence of a triggering event.

Systems and methods for providing energy management utilize wireless wide-area network broadcast signals and a decentralized receiver architecture to allow customers to make informed choices with regard to energy consumption and load shedding for particular appliances. A receiver assembly embedded within an appliance receives a broadcast signal, e.g., an FM subcarrier signal, including tariff data and other electrical grid data. A processor coupled with the receiver controls the appliance in accordance with the received data and in accordance with user-defined preferences. In some embodiments, a transceiver assembly is embedded in one or more appliances in a household. Each transceiver is configured to receive broadcast signals regarding grid data, and to communicate with other appliances and / or a usage meter over a wireless personal area network. Meter data from one or more households may be aggregated and uplinked back to the energy provider or other entities.

Methods and apparatuses for circuit design to reduce power usage, such as reducing temperature dependent power usage, and / or to improve timing, such as reducing temperature dependent delay or transition time. At least one embodiment of the present invention reduces the power dissipation and improves the timing of an integrated circuit to optimize the design. A thermal analysis is used to determine the temperature dependent power dissipation of a circuit and the temperature distribution of the circuit resulting from dissipating the heat created by the temperature dependent power dissipation. Then, the components of the design are selectively transformed to reduce the power dissipation and to improve timing based on the temperature solution. The transformation may include placement changes and netlist changes, such as the change of transistor threshold voltages for cells or for blocks of the circuit chip.

A media processing system and device with improved power usage characteristics, improved audio functionality and improved media security is provided. Embodiments of the media processing system include an audio processing subsystem that operates independently of the host processor for long periods of time, allowing the host processor to enter a low power state. Other aspects of the media processing system provide for enhanced audio effects such as mixing stored audio samples into real-time telephone audio. Still other aspects of the media processing system provide for improved media security due to the isolation of decrypted audio data from the host processor.

A load management system controller employs a method for determining carbon credits earned as a result of a control event in which power is reduced to at least one service point serviced by a utility. The controller is located remotely from the service point(s) and determines power consumed over time by at least one device located at the service point(s) to produce power consumption data. The controller stores the power consumption data. At some later point in time, the controller initiates a control event and determines an amount of power reduced during the control event based on the stored power consumption data. The controller also determines a generation mix for power that would have been supplied to the service point(s) if the control event had not occurred. The controller then determines a quantity of carbon credits earned based at least on the amount of power reduced and the generation mix.

A system, method and computer program product for processing utility data of a power grid is provided. In one embodiment, the system includes a datamart comprised of a plurality of physical databases storing utility data, a plurality of applications comprising an automated meter application configured to process power usage data from a plurality of automated meters, a power outage application configured to identify a location of a power outage, and a power restoration application configured to identify a location of a power restoration. The system may include an analysis engine comprising a plurality of analysis objects with each analysis object configured to process data to provide a specific analysis, wherein said analysis engine is accessible via one or more of the plurality of applications, and the system may include a report module configured to receive an output from the analysis engine and to output a report. The plurality of applications may also include a fault analysis application, a transformer analysis application, a theft detection application, a power flow application, a substation automation application, a load shed application and others.

The invention may be embodied in a method for operating a disk drive in a mobile device to optimize power usage. The mobile device may be a hand held computing device such as a personal digital assistant (PDA) or a mobile terminal such as a cellular telephone. Immediately after responding to a disk access command, the disk drive is in first operating mode that consumes a relatively high level of power and may transition to a second operating mode that consumes a relatively low level of power. A transition from the second operating mode to the first operating mode consumes a transition quantity of power. A predictive technique tracks a user's usage pattern and adapts an operating mode transition time based on the usage pattern.

A method and system for enabling directed temperature / power management at the DIMM-level and / or DRAM-level utilizing intelligent scheduling of memory access operations received at the memory controller. Hot spots within the memory subsystem, caused by operating the DIMMs / DRAMs above predetermined / preset threshold power / temperature values for operating a DIMM and / or a DRAM, are avoided / controlled by logic within the memory controller. The memory controller logic throttles the number / frequency at which commands (read / write operations) are issued to the specific DIMM / DRAM based on feedback data received from the specific DIMM / DRAM reaching the preset threshold power usage value.

A method and apparatus are disclosed for performing adaptive run-time power management in a system employing a CPU and an operating system. A CPU cycle tracker (CCT) module monitors critical CPU signals and generates CPU performance data based on the critical CPU signals. An adaptive CPU throttler (THR) module uses the CPU performance data, along with a CPU percent idle value fed back from the operating system, to generate a CPU throttle control signal during predefined run-time segments of the CPU run time. The CPU throttle control signal links back to the CPU and adaptively adjusts CPU throttling and, therefore, power usage of the CPU during each of the run-time segments.

The invention may be embodied in a method for operating a disk drive in a mobile device to optimize power usage based on an application category. The mobile device may be a hand held computing device such as a personal digital assistant (PDA) or a mobile terminal such as a cellular telephone. A technique of the invention may spin down the disk drive after an adjustable delay time interval that is set based on an application category associated with a most recent data transfer command.

An OLED display device includes an array of light emitting pixels, each pixel having three or more OLEDs for emitting different colors of light specifying a gamut and at least one additional OLED for emitting a color of light within the gamut, wherein the power efficiency of the additional OLED is higher than the luminance efficiency of at least one of the three or more OLEDs; and means for driving the OLEDs in the pixels to produce a given color and luminance at a reduced power usage.

A method and system to monitor and determine energy consumption and energy efficiency of devices that use electrical and / or gas power is described. In one embodiment, a power monitoring system is configured to monitor electrical and / or gas power consumption of devices such as refrigerators, air-conditioners, washers, dryers, hot tubs, etc. Power consumption of the device is processed by the power monitoring system to determine the amount of power the device is consuming and the device's energy efficiency. In one embodiment, the power monitoring system transmits data associated with the device's power consumption, such as power efficiency, power cost, power usage, etc., to the device user and / or to a power supplier such as a utility company supplying the gas and / or electricity to the device. In one configuration, when the power efficiency of the device exceeds a predefined threshold, the user and / or power supplier is notified. The power monitoring system may be configured to be integral with and / or attached to the device being measured. The power monitoring system may provide an output on a display apparatus associated with the power monitoring system attached to the device being monitored and / or the output may be part of a graphics display on a computer monitor, for example.

A mobile device may include a geopositioning receiver and an accelerometer, which may be engaged in an alternating manner depending on whether the mobile device is at rest or in motion. If the mobile device is in motion, the geopositioning receiver may remain engaged to provide a real-time location of the mobile device, which may be used to generate various location-triggered notifications and to control location-triggered applications. If the mobile device is at rest, the geopositioning receiver may be disengaged to reduce power usage and instead the accelerometer may be engaged to monitor whether the mobile device is put back in motion. If so, the geopositioning receiver may be reengaged. A sequence of locations where the mobile device came to rest may be stored to construct a location profile, which may allow closely targeted offers and advertisements to be generated based on the daily activity patterns of users.

A method for the dynamically determining utilization of remote device applications based on historical application usage patterns, application power requirements, and available power reserves stored on a remote device, wherein the method includes defining a set of individual applications and activities on a remote device; determining a rate of power consumption per unit of time for each of the set of individual applications and activities; determining usage patterns of the set of individual applications and activities; determining a total expected power usage; comparing the total expected power usage to the available power reserves; and implementing a power budget if the total expected power usage exceeds the available power reserves.

A method and apparatus for controlling power consumption of a facility, building or simply a collection of one or more devices, by load shedding when power consumption is above, or is predicted to be above, a preselected setpoint, but only if electrical power on the spot market cannot be purchased at or below a preselected price. The apparatus and method of the invention optimizes power usage by taking advantage of the buying of electricity as a commodity on the spot market. As a further aspect of the invention, in the situation of a supermarket for example, which refrigerates food products, artificial product core temperature sensors or direct insertion product sensors can be used to continuously monitor the refrigerated temperature of perishable products. A controller would constantly monitor these temperatures to allow a precise load shedding routine to be implemented.

An apparatus comprising a power source, one or more sensors, a transceiver, and a memory. The power source may be configured to store energy to power the apparatus. The one or more sensors may be configured to receive captured data from one of a plurality of sources. The transceiver may be configured to send and receive data to and from a wireless network. The processor may be configured to execute computer readable instructions. The memory may be configured to store a set of instructions executable by the processor. The instructions may be configured to (A) evaluate an expected power usage budget calculated using a predictive model of future energy consumption and (B) (i) store the captured data in the memory in a first mode and (ii) transmit the captured data to a remote storage device in a second mode. The first mode or the second mode is selected based on characteristics of the captured data received from the sensors.

An Adaptive Computing Ensemble (ACE) includes a plurality of flexible computation units as well as an execution controller to allocate the units to Computing Ensembles (CEs) and to assign threads to the CEs. The units may be any combination of ACE-enabled units, including instruction fetch and decode units, integer execution and pipeline control units, floating-point execution units, segmentation units, special-purpose units, reconfigurable units, and memory units. Some of the units may be replicated, e.g. there may be a plurality of integer execution and pipeline control units. Some of the units may be present in a plurality of implementations, varying by performance, power usage, or both. The execution controller dynamically alters the allocation of units to threads in response to changing performance and power consumption observed behaviors and requirements. The execution controller also dynamically alters performance and power characteristics of the ACE-enabled units, according to the observed behaviors and requirements.