Patent attributes
A microcontroller which operates in a low power consumption mode is provided. A microcontroller includes a CPU, a memory, and a peripheral circuit such as a timer circuit. A register in the peripheral circuit is provided in an interface with a bus line. A power gate for controlling supply control is provided. The microcontroller can operate not only in a normal operation mode where all circuits are active, but also in a low power consumption mode where some of the circuits are active. A volatile memory and nonvolatile memory are provided in a register, such as a register of the CPU. Data in the volatile memory is backed up in the nonvolatile memory before the power supply is stopped. In the case where the operation mode returns to the normal mode, when power supply is started again, data in the nonvolatile memory is written back into the volatile memory.
