A host device is managed that communicates with a peripheral device via an interface on the basis of a high frequency clock; the host device is in a suspended state in which the high frequency clock is deactivated. At the host device, an activation state of the peripheral device is detected (21) on the interface. Then the duration of a period of time (T1) since the detection of the activation state is counted, on the basis of a low frequency clock. Then this activation state is maintained on the interface (23) by means of hardware before the period of time expires.