US 2014/0006847 A1 · Defect Management in Memory Systems

Abstract

Defect management logic extends a useful life of a memory system. For example, as discussed herein, failure detection logic detects occurrence of a failure in a memory system. Defect management logic determines a type of the failure such as whether the failure is an infant mortality type failure or a late-life type of failure. Depending on the type of failure, the defect management logic performs different operations to extend the useful life of the memory system. For example, for early life failures, the defect management logic can retire a portion of the block including the failure. For late life failures, due to excessive reads/writes, the defect management logic can convert the failing block from operating in a first bit-per-cell storage density mode to operating in a second bit-per-cell storage density mode.

Claims29

Dependent claims

An apparatus comprising:

failure detection logic to produce a notification upon detection of an access failure in a block of a non-volatile memory device, the block being one of multiple blocks in the non-volatile memory device;
defect management logic to receive the notification of the access failure and, responsive to the notification, reconfigure the block to remedy the access failure;
and
configuration management logic to store settings information of the reconfigured block, the settings information enabling subsequent access to at least a portion of the reconfigured block.

1 more element

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.

Defect Management in Memory Systems

Life of this patent

Defect Management in Memory Systems

Life of this patent

Abstract

Claims29