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:
May. 04, 2004
Filed:
Mar. 07, 2002
Mark Alan McClain, San Diego, CA (US);
Michael Garrett Tanaka, San Jose, CA (US);
Ralf Muenster, Los Altos, CA (US);
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Abstract
In protecting Flash memory data, a flexible system and method provides for different levels of protection. It offers the ability to dynamically lock a sector of memory using a dynamic protection bit in volatile memory. It offers persistent locking of a sector using a non-volatile bit in memory and locking this status using a lock bit in volatile memory. It offers yet further protection by including a password mode which requires a password to clear the lock bit. The password is located in an unreadable, one time programmable area of the memory. The memory also includes areas, whose protection state is controlled by an input signal, for storing boot code in a protected manner.