Method for programming of memory cells, in particular of the flash type, and corresponding programming architecture
OwnerDavide Torrisi, Edoardo Nocita +1inventors
InventorsDavide Torrisi, Edoardo Nocita, Alessandro Tumminia
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Abstract
A method is described for programming memory cells, in particular of the Flash type. In accordance with the method, a verification is performed with a first parallelism (M) in which a reading is carried out for determining the state of a group of memory cells, a determination is performed of a programming parallelism (np), based on the results of the verification, and a real programming of the memory cells carried out with the programming parallelism (np). An architecture is also described for programming memory cells in particular of the Flash type.
Claims7
A flash memory comprising:
- a plurality of cells;
- at least one microcontroller to selectively program a first number of said cells at a time or a second number of cells at a time, said first and second numbers being different;
- a counter and a verify block coupled to said counter;
- a combinatorial portion to generate a control flag to select the first or second number of cells;
- a charge pump;
- and
- a register having a second parallelism corresponding to a driving capability value of the charge pump according to the relation:
- n=Icharge_pump/Icell
- wherein
- Icharge_pump is a maximum value of the current which can be supplied by the charge pump, and
- Icell is a value of the current absorbed by a memory cell during a programming.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.