Power efficient method for cold storage data retention management
AssigneeNXGN Data, Inc.
InventorsNader Salessi, Joao Alcantara
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A system and method for storing infrequently accessed data with reduced power consumption. In one embodiment, a solid state drive (SSD) includes flash memory and environmental data logging circuitry. The SSD is shut off or operated in a sleep mode to reduce power consumption, and turned on or transitioned to an active mode as needed when data on the SSD is to be accessed, or when a calculation, based on a number of erase cycles previously performed in the flash memory and on a temperature history of the SSD indicates that a data refresh may be needed to prevent data corruption in the SSD, due to data retention limitation of the nonvolatile memory in the SSD.
Claims17
A method for operating a solid state drive (SSD) connected to a host, the SSD comprising nonvolatile memory and environmental data logging circuitry (EDLC) and a source of a battery power, the method comprising:
- requesting, by the host, a length of a first time interval from the SSD;
- providing, by the SSD, the length of the first time interval to the host;
- discontinuing, by the host, during the first time interval, a primary power supplied to the SSD;
- powering of the EDLC, by the SSD, from the source of the battery power during the first time interval;
- logging, by the EDLC, of environmental data at a plurality of points in time;
- restoring, by the host, of the primary power supplied to the SSD, at the end of the first time interval;
- and
- refreshing of data stored in the SSD, by the SSD, when a module evaluated by the SSD indicates that, based on the logged environmental data, refreshing of the data is required.
A method for operating a solid state drive (SSD) connected to a host, the SSD comprising nonvolatile memory, the host comprising an environmental data logging system, the method comprising:
- requesting, by the host, a length of a first time interval from the SSD;
- providing, by the SSD, the length of the first time interval to the host;
- discontinuing, by the host, during the first time interval, a power supplied to the SSD;
- logging, by the environmental data logging system, of environmental data at a plurality of points in time during the first interval;
- restoring, by the host, of the power supplied to the SSD, at the end of the first time interval;
- providing, by the host, logged environmental data to the SSD;
- and
- refreshing of data stored in the SSD, by the SSD, when a module evaluated by the SSD indicates that, based on the logged environmental data, refreshing of the data is required.
A method for operating a solid state drive (SSD) connected to a host, the SSD comprising nonvolatile memory and environmental data logging circuitry (EDLC), the method comprising:
- instructing, by the host, the SSD to transition to a sleep mode;
- transitioning, by the SSD, to the sleep mode;
- logging, by the EDLC, of environmental data at a plurality of points in time, while the SSD is in the sleep mode;
- instructing, by the host, the SSD to transition to an active mode;
- transitioning, by the SSD, to the active mode;
- refreshing of data stored in the SSD, by the SSD, when a module evaluated by the SSD indicates that, based on the logged environmental data, refreshing of the data is required;
- and
- sending, by the SSD, status information to the host, wherein the status information comprises a new sleep interval.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.