The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 05, 1999
Filed:
Apr. 22, 1998
Saroj Pathak, Los Altos Hills, CA (US);
Glen A Rosendale, Palo Alto, CA (US);
James E Payne, Boulder Creek, CA (US);
Nianglamching Hangzo, San Jose, CA (US);
Atmel Corporation, San Jose, CA (US);
Abstract
A sense amplifier for use in a serial configuration memory includes multiple stages which are enabled and disabled in a controller manner, in response to a control pulse. The control pulse is produced every Nth period of an externally provided clock signal, the clock being used to clock out a bitstream representing the contents of the memory device. In a preferred embodiment, N such sense amps are utilized to read out in parallel fashion the N memory cells (bits) that constitute an accessed memory location. The sense amps are therefore active only of a period of time sufficient to read out a memory cell.