System on a Chip with Always-On Processor

摘要

In an embodiment, a system on a chip (SOC) includes a component that remains powered when the remainder of the SOC is powered off. The component may include a sensor capture unit to capture data from various device sensors, and may filter the captured sensor data. Responsive to the filtering, the component may wake up the remainder of the SOC to permit the processing. The component may store programmable configuration data, matching the state at the time the SOC was most recently powered down, for the other components of the SOC, in order to reprogram them after wakeup. In some embodiments, the component may be configured to wake up the memory controller within the SOC and the path to the memory controller, in order to write the data to memory. The remainder of the SOC may remain powered down.

主权项

1. An integrated circuit comprising:
a plurality of components; and a first component coupled to the plurality of components, the first component configured to remain powered on while the plurality of components are powered off, and the first component configured to couple to at least one sensor in a system that includes the integrated circuit, wherein the first component includes a processor, a sensor capture circuit, and a memory, wherein the sensor capture circuit is configured to capture sensor data in the memory from the at least one sensor, and wherein the processor is configured to perform processing on the captured sensor data during a time that the plurality of components are powered down.