Patent ID: 7716669

Claim:
A multimedia gaming console, comprising: a central processing unit, upon which concurrent system applications are executed to provide system services for the console and upon which a multimedia gaming application is executed to provide a multimedia gaming experience to a user of the console, wherein: the concurrent system applications are executed in accordance with a schedule to utilize a constant level of system resources; the system services are provided using a consistent interface across different multimedia applications running on the multimedia console; and a reservation of a graphics processor utilization is performed and messages generated by said concurrent system applications are displayed by using a graphics processor interrupt; a graphics processing unit; a writable memory in communication with said graphics processing unit; and a memory in communication with said central processing unit, said memory having thereon executable code for reserving system resources for use by the concurrent system applications, including a predetermined amount of processor utilization as provided by the central processing unit, a predetermined amount of networking bandwidth as provided by a network to which the gaming console is communicatively coupled, and a predetermined amount of processor utilization as provided by the graphics processing unit; and said system applications executing concurrently with the multimedia application on said multimedia console, said multimedia application controlling system resources that are not reserved by said executable code and not controlling system resources that are reserved by the executable code, at least some of the system applications providing system functionalities to the multimedia application and the user.