Information Storage Devices, Inc.

Peter Holzmann

Hieu Van Tran

James Brennan, Jr

Anthony Dunne

Chun-Mai Liu

Albert V Kordesch

Kung-Yen Su

Geoff Jackson

A trimbit circuit for flash memory integrated circuits is described. The trimbit circuit is used to store the addresses of bad rows and/or columns in flash memory arrays. Furthermore the trimbit circuit is used to store the trimbits for trimable circuits in the integrated circuit, i.e. voltage references, precision oscillator, etc. The invention includes a row of flash memory trimcells and a trimcell differential amplifier circuit. The trimcell differential amplifier circuit can serially shift in trimbits into a latch and serially shift out trimbits without having to program the flash memory trimcells. The final settings of the trimbits can be programmed by means of a high voltage buffer. A non-overlapping clock generator and additional logic is also included to control the circuit.

Trimbit circuit for flash memory integrated circuits

An analog recording and playback system using non-volatile flash memory. An array of flash memory cells is used to store an analog signal and retrieve the stored analog signal on a real-time basis. A plurality of column driver circuits are coupled to the columns of flash memory cells for simultaneous programming and reading. A programming algorithm is used to write the analog signal within an operating range of the flash memory cells since the operating range may shift due to process variations. The system includes trimbit circuits to provide a trimmable initial programming voltage, programming step, programming current, read current, and select gate voltage. The system further includes a Serial Peripheral Interface ('SPI') that interfaces with a host microcontroller. The host microcontroller can send a number of commands to the system through the SPI for efficient message management. These commands include the basic commands to record or playback and various addressing and message cueing options. The system utilizes row and column redundancy to increase production yield.

Recording and playback integrated system for analog non-volatile flash

Trimbit circuit for flash memory

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Campbell, CA, United States of America

Peter Holzmann