Improved techniques for recovering from an error condition without requiring a re-transmittal of data across a high-speed data link and for improved power usage are disclosed herein. A data stream is initiated. This stream includes different types of packets. Error correcting code (ECC) is selectively imposed on a control data type packet. A transmitter node and a receiver node are connected via a hard link that has multiple virtual channels. Each virtual channel is associated with a corresponding power-consuming node. When the receiver node receives the control data type packet, error correction is performed if needed without re-transmittal. When a final data type packet is transmitted for each virtual channel, the transmitter node transmits an end condition type packet. A corresponding power-consuming node that corresponds to the respective virtual channel transitions from an active state to a low power state.