High-speed read-write circuitry for semi-conductor memory

Abstract

A semi-conductor memory device having a wide write data bandwidth is provided with high speed read-write circuitry having data amplifiers that are activated to accelerate amplification of write data signals being driven by write data drivers onto data lines of the cell array of the device during memory write cycles, as well as activated to amplify read data signals on the data lines during memory read cycles. Moreover, the data amplifiers are activated in a self-timed manner. In one embodiment, the device is further provided with a read data buffer that is constituted with a regenerative latch and an input stage, and a write data buffer having multiple entries. The input stage of the read data buffer isolates or couples the regenerative latch to the data lines depending on whether the data lines are in a pre-charged state or not. In one embodiment, the data amplifiers and the write drivers are further arranged to enable write data in the write buffer to be merged with the masked read data from the memory array when a read transaction hits the write buffer.