Exploiting ZigBee in Reducing WiFi Power Consumption for Mobile Devices

We present HoWiES, a system that saves energy consumed by WiFi interfaces in mobile devices with the assistance of ZigBee radios. The core component of HoWiES is a WiFi-ZigBee message delivery scheme that enables WiFi radios to convey different messages to ZigBee radios in mobile devices. Based on the WiFi-ZigBee message delivery scheme, we design three protocols that target three WiFi energy saving opportunities in scanning, standby and wakeup respectively. We have implemented the HoWiES system with two mobile devices platforms and two AP platforms. Our real-world experimental evaluation shows that our system can convey thousands of different messages from WiFi radios to ZigBee radios with an accuracy over 98 percent, and our energy saving protocols, while maintaining the comparable wakeup delay to that of the standard 802.11 power save mode, save 88 and 85 percent of energy consumed in scanning state and standby state respectively.