Patent ID: 8385313

Claim:
A multi-tier method of dynamically adjusting polling frequencies at which end stations are transmitted a polling message, the end stations desiring to transmit data being required to respond to the polling message with a transmission request, the method comprising: monitoring data transmission activities of the plurality of end stations; individually characterizing each end station to be one of active and inactive based on the transmission activities; setting an inactive polling frequency for a first plurality of end stations characterized as being inactive; setting an active polling frequency for a second plurality of end stations characterized as being active, the active polling frequency being greater than the inactive polling frequency; and individually characterizing the plurality of end stations to be active and inactive depending an elapse time since each end station last transmitted the transmission request, the active characterization corresponding with the elapse time being less than a time threshold and the inactive characterization corresponding with the elapse time being equal to or greater than the time threshold.