Serially sensing the output of multilevel cell arrays
OwnerMatthew Goldman, Balaji Srinivasan +1inventors
InventorsMatthew Goldman, Balaji Srinivasan, Hernan Castro
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Abstract
In accordance with one embodiment, a serial sensing scheme may be utilized to sense the information stored on a multilevel cell. The more significant bit of the information in the cell may sense initially. The more significant bit information may be used to determine which of at least two reference levels to utilize to determine a less significant bit of the cell.
Claims48
A method comprising:
- providing the output from an array cell to a first input of a sense amplifier;
- feeding back the output of the sense amplifier to a latch;
- and
- feeding the output from the latch to control logic to select one of at least two references based on the output of said sense amplifier.
A multilevel memory comprising:
- a sense amplifier coupled to an array cell to be sensed;
- and
- a first latch coupled to the output of said sense amplifier, said latch to store a signal to select between one of two reference levels to be coupled to the sense amplifier.
A multilevel cell memory comprising:
- a sense amplifier having an output;
- a first path coupled to the output of said sense amplifier to selectively receive the more significant bit data from the sense amplifier;
- and
- a second path coupled to the output of said sense amplifier to selectively receive less significant bit data from said sense amplifier.
A method comprising:
- selectively passing more significant bit data from the output of a multilevel cell sense amplifier to a first latch;
- and
- selectively passing less significant bit data from said sense amplifier to a second latch.
An article comprising a medium storing instructions that enable a processor-based system to:
- selectively pass more significant bit data from the output of a multilevel cell sense amplifier to a first latch;
- and
- selectively pass less significant bit data from said sense amplifier to a second latch.
A multilevel memory cell comprising:
- a sense amplifier;
- a circuit coupled to the output of said sense amplifier;
- a latch coupled to said circuit;
- and
- said circuit including a driver coupled to a pass gate, said driver coupled to an output of said sense amplifier, and said pass gate coupled to said latch.
A method comprising:
- providing an output from an array cell to a first input of a sense amplifier;
- and
- feeding back the output of the sense amplifier to a latch through a driver coupled to a pass gate.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.