Non-volatile memory with countermeasures for select gate disturb during program pre-charge

A method, comprising:

• pre-charging a first NAND string, comprising:
• driving a control line connected to a first select gate with a staircase waveform of a sequence of voltage levels sequentially increasing to a select gate pre-charge voltage;
• and
• while driving the first select gate with the staircase waveform, biasing a first word line connected to a non-selected memory cell with a bypass voltage, where the non-selected memory cell is adjacent to the first select gate and is between the first select gate and a selected memory cell on the first NAND string, and the bypass voltage is lower than the select gate pre-charge voltage;
• and
• subsequent to pre-charging the first NAND string, applying a programming pulse to a second word line connected the selected memory cell.

An apparatus, comprising:

• an array of non-volatile memory cells including a plurality of NAND strings, each NAND string including a select gate through which the NAND string is connected to a corresponding bit line, a first memory cell adjacent to the select gate and a second memory cell, wherein each of the select gates is connect to a select line, each of the first memory cells is connected to a first word line, and each of the second memory cells is connected to a second word line;
• means for programming the second memory cell on selected ones of the NAND strings;
• and
• means for pre-charging the plurality of NAND strings, including both the selected NAND strings and non-selected ones of the NAND strings, for the programming, the pre-charging including biasing bit lines corresponding to the selected NAND strings to a program enable value, biasing bit lines corresponding to non-selected NAND strings to a program inhibit value, biasing the first word line to turn on the first memory cells, and biasing the select line with a rising waveform having a plurality of steps increasing to a value sufficient to turn on the select gates of the non-selected NAND strings.