Patent ID: 8286011

Claim:
A method of waking at least one processing unit of a processor, connected to a network, from a sleep mode, wherein the processor also includes a network interface circuit coupled to the processing unit and the network, the method comprising: receiving a packet by the network interface unit by way of a network connection; classifying the packet in accordance with predetermined categories, said predetermined categories including interesting and not interesting; storing the received packet in a memory if the packet is classified as an interesting packet; initiating a receive timer upon receipt of a first interesting packet; incrementing a counter upon receipt of an interesting packet; and asserting a wake-up interrupt when at least one of said counter reaches a predetermined count value and said timer expires, wherein said wake-up interrupt instructs the processor to cause the at least one processing unit to transition from the sleep mode to an active mode, and wherein said predetermined categories includes an immediate wake-up category, and wherein if the received packet is classified as an immediate wake-up packet then said wake-up interrupt is asserted.