KR100403733B1 - Apparatus and method for controlling power in mobile communication terminal - Google Patents

Abstract

end. The technical field to which the invention described in the claims belongs

The present invention relates to an apparatus and a method for controlling power in a mobile communication terminal.

I. The technical problem to be solved by the invention

Provided are an apparatus and a method for saving power when a mobile communication terminal does not receive a base station signal.

All. Summary of Solution of the Invention

An apparatus according to an embodiment of the present invention is a device for controlling power in a mobile communication terminal, the wireless unit for searching whether a signal transmitted from a base station is received, and connected to a power supply unit to supply power to the mobile communication terminal through a switch. A power supply unit for supplying and a control unit for performing the switch off when the signal from the base station for more than a predetermined time through the wireless unit.

In addition, the switch may be configured to block only power supplied to a circuit for performing wireless communication, or may be configured to block all power. And if only the circuit for performing the wireless communication is cut off the power is characterized in that it further comprises a display unit for indicating that the power supply of the wireless circuit is cut off.

la. Important uses of the invention

Used in mobile communication terminals.

Description

Apparatus and method for controlling power in a mobile terminal {APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR CONTROLLING POWER IN MOBILE COMMUNICATION TERMINAL}

The present invention relates to a control apparatus and method of a mobile communication terminal, and more particularly, to a control apparatus and method of a power source in a mobile communication terminal.

Typically, the mobile communication terminal is configured to attach a battery that can be attached to ensure activity. Therefore, in order to use a mobile terminal for a long time, research and development continue in two different directions. The first of the above research and development is a method for extending the life of the battery by storing more charge in the same size battery, and the second is a battery that accepts the same charge by minimizing the power used in the mobile communication terminal. Even if you use it is a method for longer use.

In general, research and development to store more charge in the battery is continuously made, but the research and development costs are very high, the progress of the research is also very slow. Accordingly, a method for saving power of a battery using various methods has been proposed in a mobile communication terminal, which will be described below.

In order to reduce power consumption used in a mobile communication terminal, a method for reducing power consumption in a circuit for processing a signal is required. As such, in order to reduce power consumption in the circuit, low voltage devices may be used to reduce power consumption. You can also reduce power consumption by simplifying the circuit to reduce the number of devices. These are the elements and circuits used in the mobile communication terminal.

In addition, a method of performing an intermittent mode has been proposed as a method for reducing power generally used in a mobile communication terminal. Such an intermittent mode is performed while the mobile communication terminal is located in a predetermined base station area. Hereinafter, the interruption mode will be described.

When the mobile communication terminal is in a standby state, i.e., a state in which data transmission and reception are not performed, the mobile communication terminal searches only predetermined slots of a paging channel transmitted from the base station and checks whether a call is received. In this case, it is a method of checking whether a paging signal is received by setting a predetermined slot in advance by searching with the base station and searching only the set slots. Through this, power can be saved by not applying power to a receiver of a wireless circuit at a time other than a preset slot.

Saving the battery power of the mobile communication terminal through the intermittent mode is limited to the case where the mobile communication terminal is located in a predetermined base station as described above. That is, the mobile communication terminal performs the intermittent mode through negotiation with the base station where the mobile communication terminal is located. Therefore, in order for the base station and the mobile communication terminal to negotiate, the base station to which the mobile communication terminal belongs must be known, and at the same time, the base station must also be aware of the location of the mobile communication terminal.

The mobile communication terminal stores information of the base station to which it belongs and the adjacent base station together to recognize the location of the base station. As such, in order to store information of the base station, the base station to which it belongs must be searched. As such, the search for the base station to which it belongs is generally performed in the initial operation of the mobile communication terminal. When the initial power is applied to the mobile communication terminal, a process of searching for a base station is performed. That is, in order to search for the base station, the mobile communication terminal applies power to the radio receiving circuit to search for the base station by inspecting a pilot signal received from the base station. When the search of the base station is completed, the mobile communication terminal transmits a location registration message to the base station.

Through this process, the search of the base station is completed. However, the searching of the base station consumes a lot of power because power must be continuously applied to the receiving end of the radio circuit as described above. Therefore, when there is a user in an area where a signal is not received from the base station, the mobile communication terminal continuously checks the signal of the base station. In addition, even when the user continues to move the predetermined area and the signal of the base station is weakly received and is not received again, the mobile communication terminal continuously applies power to the radio circuit, thereby consuming a lot of power.

However, since the user is often unable to recognize this, there is a problem that the power of the mobile communication terminal is continuously wasted.

Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and method for efficiently controlling the supply of power in a mobile communication terminal.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and method for efficiently controlling power supply according to whether a base station receives a signal from a mobile communication terminal.

An apparatus of the present invention for achieving the above objects is a device for power control in a mobile communication terminal, a wireless unit for searching whether or not to receive a signal transmitted from a base station, and connected to a power supply device through the switch through the mobile communication terminal The power supply unit for supplying power to the power supply and the control unit for performing the switch off when not receiving a signal from the base station for more than a predetermined time through the wireless unit.

In addition, the switch may be configured to block only power supplied to a circuit for performing wireless communication, or may be configured to block all power.

And if only the circuit for performing the wireless communication is cut off the power is characterized in that it further comprises a display unit for indicating that the power supply of the wireless circuit is cut off.

The method of the present invention for achieving the above objects is a method for controlling the power in a mobile communication terminal having a power-off switch, the first time to turn on the timer and perform the base station search mode when no signal is received from the base station And a second process of transitioning to a standby state when the base station is searched in the base station search mode and turning off the power cutoff switch when the base station is not searched for the time set in the timer.

The method may further include a process of checking whether the power control is in an automatic state when no signal is received from the base station, and performing steps of performing the first and second processes only when the power control is in the automatic state as a result of the inspection. The method may further include performing a general base station search mode when the power control is not in an automatic state.

In addition to the timer, the sleep mode progression count may be counted in the search mode to perform the above processes.

1 is a block diagram of a functional block of a mobile communication terminal to which the present invention is applied;

2 is a control flowchart when power is controlled in a mobile communication terminal according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.

Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings. In addition, in describing the present invention, well-known techniques are not described in detail.

1 is a block diagram of a functional block of a mobile communication terminal to which the present invention is applied. Hereinafter, each block configuration and operation of the mobile communication terminal according to the present invention will be described in detail with reference to FIG. 1.

The control unit 111 controls the overall operation of the mobile communication terminal. In particular, the control unit 111 controls power supply when the mobile communication terminal is located in an area where a signal is not received from the base station. For this control, the control unit 111 may include a timer (not shown in FIG. 1) or a counter (not shown in FIG. 1) therein. Detailed description of the supply of power will be described in more detail with reference to the control flowchart of FIG. 2 to be described later.

The radio unit 112 converts a radio signal received from the antenna ANT into a predetermined signal under the control of the controller 111 and transmits the signal to the controller 111 or the voice processor 113. In addition, the wireless unit 112 converts the coded signal received from the voice processing unit 113 into a signal of a band for transmitting as a wireless signal and outputs the signal to the antenna ANT. The signal output from the wireless unit 112 to the control unit 111 is a pilot signal and a paging signal of the base station or a message received from the base station to the mobile communication terminal for data or power control during data communication, the control unit 111 ) Transmits data to be transmitted at the time of call setup or power control and data transmission to the radio section 112 and transmits the data to the base station. In addition, the signal output from the wireless unit 112 to the voice processing unit 113 becomes a coded voice signal received after the call is set up.

The voice processing unit 113 decodes the signal received from the wireless unit 112 under the control of the control unit 111, converts the signal into an electrical voice signal, and outputs it to the speaker SPK. In addition, the voice processing unit 113 codes and transmits the electric voice signal received from the microphone MIC under the control of the control unit 111 and transmits it to the wireless unit 112.

The memory 114 may include a ROM memory, a RAM memory, and the like, and temporarily stores data generated when the controller 111 controls the data, and stores data necessary for controlling the mobile communication terminal and data stored by the user. do. Therefore, the memory 114 stores control data according to the present invention.

The key input unit 115 has a key matrix structure and includes numeric keys for dialing and function keys for performing various functions. Therefore, a key signal corresponding to a key input by the user is generated and provided to the controller 111. The display unit 116 displays the operation state of the mobile communication terminal, the remaining power level, the received electric field strength, and the like. In addition, the display unit 116 displays the control unit 111 when the power cut-off is limited to the wireless unit 112 and stops the search of the base station according to the present invention.

The power supply unit 117 is connected to an external power source to supply power input from the outside to each of the above-described parts, and may be simultaneously connected to a battery. In addition, the power supply unit 117 is provided with at least one power supply switch (not shown in Figure 1) therein, the switch is a switch for shutting off the entire power supply or to cut off the power to a predetermined circuit. . According to the present invention, the switch provided in the power supply unit 117 may be a switch to cut off power to all circuits for wireless communication. That is, the memory 114, the key input unit 115, the display unit 116, and the controller 111 may be configured to supply power. Alternatively, the switch may be configured such that power is not supplied to all of the blocks, that is, the power of the mobile communication terminal is turned off.

2 is a control flowchart when power is controlled in a mobile communication terminal according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, control is performed when power is controlled in a mobile communication terminal according to the present invention. Describe the process in detail.

The controller 111 maintains the standby state in step 200. The standby state refers to a state of checking a paging signal and receiving a pilot signal received from a base station, and simultaneously checking whether a key is input from a user. In this case, the control unit 111 proceeds to step 202, and when the signal received from the base station is not received and the service is not performed (No Service), that is, no signal is received from the base station. Check for status. The control unit 111 proceeds to step 204 when the service cannot be performed because a signal is not received from the base station in step 202.

In step 204, the controller 111 checks whether the memory 114 is set to the automatic power control state. The controller 111 proceeds to step 210 in the automatic control state as a result of the inspection, and proceeds to step 206 in the case of the automatic control state. The setting of the automatic control state may be configured to be set by the user, or the program may be configured to be set in advance at the time of manufacture of the mobile communication terminal. If the setting is possible by the user, since a method of selecting and setting from a menu is generally used, a detailed description thereof will be omitted.

If it is not set to the automatic control state, the control unit 111 proceeds to step 206 to perform the base station search mode. The process of searching for reception of a signal from such a base station is as follows. The control unit 111 controls the radio unit 112 to inspect each channel and frequency band to inspect a signal received from the base station. In this case, the sleep mode may be configured to save power. That is, the base station is searched at predetermined time intervals without continuously searching for the base station, and if the base station is not searched, the sleep mode is performed. The sleep mode refers to not performing any operation for searching of the base station.

The controller 111 performs a base station search mode and proceeds to step 208 to check whether a base station signal is received. The control unit 111 proceeds to the standby state of step 200 when the base station signal is received as a result of the check, and proceeds to step 206 to continuously perform the base station search mode when the base station signal is not received.

On the contrary, when the inspection result of step 204 is in the automatic power control state, the control unit 111 proceeds to step 210. In step 210, the controller 111 turns on a timer set to a predetermined time. The controller 111 performs the base station search mode in step 212 after the timer is turned on. In this case, the base station search mode may be configured in the same manner as the base station search in step 206. The control unit 111 searches for the base station in step 212 and proceeds to step 214 and checks whether the base station signal is received from the wireless unit 112. If the base station signal is received as a result of the check, it transitions to the standby state of step 200. However, if the base station signal is not received, the process proceeds to step 216 and it is checked whether a time-out of the timer set in step 210 occurs. If the check result time-out occurs, the control unit 111 proceeds to step 218; otherwise, proceeds to step 212 to perform the base station search mode.

In step 218, the control unit 111 controls the switch of the power supply unit 117 to perform power off. In this case, when the switch provided in the power supply unit 117 is configured to cut off all power, all power of the mobile communication terminal is cut off. However, when configured to block only a portion necessary for performing communication, it may be configured to perform other additional functions of the mobile communication terminal and no longer perform a search operation of the base station through the wireless unit 112. In this case, the display unit 116 controls the display to be performed.

In FIG. 2, the method using the timer has been described. However, if the sleep mode and the base station search mode are repeated when the base station is searched in step 212, it may be configured without using a timer. This does not include step 210 of FIG. 2. That is, when it is set to the automatic power control state, the control unit 111 proceeds to step 212. The counter is reset when the first base station is searched. The controller 111 performs a search of the base station and increments the counter before proceeding to the sleep mode. Then check whether the counter value is over the preset value. If the check result is greater than or equal to the preset value, the process proceeds to step 218 and the power is turned off. If the base station signal is received at this time, the process proceeds to step 200.

In addition, in the above description, it is described that the counter is increased before proceeding to the sleep mode. Alternatively, the counter may be configured to increase when the counter goes from the sleep mode to the base station search mode. Even in this configuration, the counter value may be inspected before or after the start of the base station search.

Even in this configuration, according to the switch configured in the power supply unit 117, it may be configured by dividing the entire power cut off or only the wireless unit 112 cut off.

In the above detailed description of the present invention, the control of the power source when there is no base station of the power source according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention has been described through specific examples. However, various modifications may be made without departing from the scope of the present invention. Therefore, the scope of the present invention should not be limited to the described embodiments, but should be determined not only by the claims below, but also by the equivalents of the claims.

As described above, when the user does not recognize and leaves the area of the base station, the power of the mobile communication terminal can be efficiently controlled to increase the use time of the battery.

Claims (15)

An apparatus for controlling power in a mobile communication terminal, A wireless unit for receiving a signal of each channel and frequency band transmitted from a base station, converting the signal into a predetermined signal and outputting the signal, and transmitting data to the base station during communication; A power supply unit for supplying power from a power supply unit to each part constituting the mobile communication terminal; A switch for connecting or disconnecting the power supply unit from the wireless unit by a switching control signal; A memory for storing automatic power control values set by the user, And a control unit for outputting a switching control signal for turning off the switch when the automatic power control value stored in the memory is in an automatic state and the base station signal is not received from the wireless unit for a predetermined time or more. Power control device in the communication terminal. delete The method of claim 1, And a display unit for indicating that the power supply of the wireless circuit is cut off when the power supplied to the wireless circuit is cut off. An apparatus for controlling power in a mobile communication terminal, A wireless unit for receiving a signal of each channel and frequency band transmitted from a base station, converting the signal into a predetermined signal and outputting the signal, and transmitting data to the base station during communication; A power supply unit for supplying power from a power supply unit to each part constituting the mobile communication terminal; A switch for connecting or disconnecting the power supply unit from the wireless unit by a switching control signal; A memory for storing automatic power control values set by the user, A counter for counting the number of repetitions of the base station search mode and the sleep mode by the count control signal; If the base station signal is not received from the radio unit, the base station search mode and the sleep mode are repeatedly performed, and upon initial entry into the base station search mode, the counter is reset, and the number of repetitions of the base station search mode and the sleep mode is repeated. And a control unit for outputting a count control signal and outputting a switching control signal for turning off the switch when the counter is greater than or equal to a preset value. delete The method of claim 4, wherein And a display unit for indicating that the power supply of the wireless circuit is cut off when the power supplied to the wireless circuit is cut off. A power source in a mobile communication terminal including a timer having a predetermined value, a switch connecting or disconnecting by a switching control signal between a wireless unit and a power supply unit, and a memory storing an automatic power control value set by a user In the method for controlling, A first process of turning on the timer and performing a base station search mode when the base station signal is not received from the wireless unit and the automatic power control value stored in the memory is automatically set; And a second process of generating the switching control signal to switch off the switch when the base station is searched in the base station search mode when the base station is searched and the base station is not searched for the time set in the timer. Power control method in the terminal. delete The method of claim 7, wherein And repeating a base station search mode and a sleep mode when the automatic power control value stored in the memory is not automatic. delete delete A power source in a mobile communication terminal including a timer having a predetermined value, a switch connecting or disconnecting by a switching control signal between a wireless unit and a power supply unit, and a memory storing an automatic power control value set by a user In the method for controlling, A first step of repeatedly performing a sleep mode and a base station search mode in which a base station signal is not received from the wireless unit and an automatic power control value stored in the memory is automatically set; Resetting a counter value in an initial base station search mode, and then counting the number of times of transition to the sleep mode from the base station search mode; And a third process of generating the switching control signal to shut off the switch when the counted value is equal to or greater than a preset value. The method of claim 12, And transitioning to a standby state when the base station is searched if the counted value is less than a preset value. delete The method of claim 12, And repeating a base station search mode and a sleep mode when the automatic power control value stored in the memory is not automatic.