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:
Apr. 04, 2000
Filed:
Dec. 02, 1998
Sony Corporation, , JP;
Abstract
A nonvolatile semiconductor memory device capable of improving a reliability of a spare region, capable of improving the reliability of a data region in accordance with a method of use, and capable of realizing a function of an additional writing as a multi-level memory, and an IC memory card using the same, provided with a data region capable of storing 4-level and binary data; a spare region capable of storing binary data; data region use decoders for supplying a drive voltage to the data region; spare region use decoders and for supplying the drive voltage to the spare region; a latch circuit for transferring data with the data region in accordance with the number of levels of the multi-level data to be stored in the data region and stopping the supply of the drive voltage of the sub decoder when the transfer of data is normally completed; and a latch circuit for transferring data with the spare region and stopping the supply of the drive voltage of the sub decoder when the transfer of data is normally completed.