Proxying—Reducing Network-Induced Consumption

Opportunity

When today's PCs are in their sleep mode, they lose most of their network connectivity. This is a principal reason for the low utilization of PC power management in commercial buildings and, increasingly, in residences. The result is that most energy used by desktop computers is when no one is present in front of them, and they are doing no useful computation.

Graphic illustrating the relationship between a sleeping PC, Proxy and the LAN or Internet. 1) double headed arrow between the PC and the LAN: PC awake, becomes idle; 2) single arrow from the PC to proxy: PC transfers network presence to proxy on going to sleep; 3) double headed arrow between proxy and LAN: proxy responds to routine network traffic for sleeping PC; 4) single arrow from proxy to PC: proxy wakes up PC as needed. Proxy can be internal (NIC) or external (in other PC, switch or router, wireless base station, or dedicated device)

Solution

One method of maintaining continuous network presence is for a PC (or any networked product) to transfer network presence to a "proxy" when entering sleep mode. The proxy can be the PC's built-in network interface (NIC) or an external device such as the local network switch. The proxy responds to routine network traffic as the PC sleeps and wakes the PC when, and only when, it is truly necessary. We refer to this process as Proxying. A NIC that implements this technology is referred to as a SmartNIC.

Status

A key first step to creating proxies is to craft a definition of full network presence that can be adopted by an appropriate standards organization. Ecma International created a committee for this purpose in August, 2008: TC32-TG21 - Proxying Support for Sleep Modes. Members participate in this process by signing up for the email reflector. The technology is also referenced in the ENERGY STAR computer specification Version 5.0 Draft 2, to go into effect in July, 2009 (this available on the Energy Star PC Spec web page). In that specification, systems with this capability are recognized as being more efficient than those without it.

Further Information

A description of the concept and potential of Proxying can be found on the Ethernet Alliance page for White Papers as Improving the Energy Efficiency of Ethernet-Connected Devices: A Proposal for Proxying. Also see our annotated Bibliography.

We provide answers to a set of Frequently Asked Questions.

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