Patent ID: 8238278
Filing Date: 2012-08-07
Classification: H04L

Abstract:
1. A battery-powered Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) communication device comprising: an activity sensor comprising an RF section and an energy detection module, the energy detection module operable to identify on-the-air energy attributable to respective beginnings of packets available to be received at the WLAN communication device; a PHY module coupled with the activity sensor to be awakened responsive to the activity sensor indicating when a packet is to be at least partially decoded by the PHY and to be shutdown, the PHY module operable to decode a full MAC address from the packet header; a MAC address parser coupled to the PHY module to receive the full MAC address and to determine whether the packet is to be received at the WLAN communication device by comparing the full MAC address to a MAC address of the WLAN communication device, the MAC address parser operable to be awakened for performing the comparing and to be shutdown after the comparing, wherein packets to be received include beacon packets, the MAC address parser further operable to indicate that the packet being received is not for the WLAN communication device, resulting in shutdown of the PHY module, before completing reception of the packet, the PHY module being in shutdown for at least as long as an estimated remaining length of the packet being received; a hardware centric Medium Access Controller (MAC) formed separately from the MAC address parser and comprising a beacon processor capable of being awakened from a shutdown state to process a beacon packet, and other components operable to be awakened independently of the beacon processor to process other packets directed to the WLAN communication device, wherein the PHY module, the MAC address parser, the beacon processor module and the other components of the hardware centric MAC are operable to be awakened and shutdown independent of each other and of a microprocessor; and said beacon processor is operable to deactivate after processing a beacon packet.