A method includes inter-chip data communications between a power-managed integrated circuit (IC) and a peer IC. The peer IC generates a data frame and prepends a discardable preamble of a predefined size to a payload of the data frame. The predefined size is a size not less than a size of data discarded by the power-managed IC upon the power-managed IC receiving a data frame while in a low-power state. The peer IC transmits the data frame to the power-managed IC. The power-managed IC, while in a low-power state, may receive the data frame from the peer IC and in response to receiving the data frame, begin exiting the low-power state. The power-managed IC, while exiting the low-power state, may discard a portion of the data frame such as for example, some or all of the discardable preamble, without discarding payload.