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:
Jun. 05, 2012
Filed:
Aug. 26, 2010
Chin-hung Chang, Tainan, TW;
Su-chueh Lo, Hsinchu, TW;
Chen-chia Fan, Zhubei, TW;
Chia-feng Cheng, Changhua, TW;
Chin-Hung Chang, Tainan, TW;
Su-Chueh Lo, Hsinchu, TW;
Chen-Chia Fan, Zhubei, TW;
Chia-Feng Cheng, Changhua, TW;
Macronix International Co., Ltd., Hsinchu, TW;
Abstract
A soft program method is provided for recovering memory cells of a memory array. In an embodiment, the method includes the following steps. Memory blocks of the memory array are soft programmed with first bias voltage. A selected memory unit within a selected memory block is then soft programmed with second bias voltage. Next, whether a judging criterion is met is determined. If not, the method is repeated from the step of soft programming with the second bias voltage; if so, whether the selected unit is a last memory unit is determined. If the selected unit is not the last memory unit, other memory unit is assigned as the selected memory unit and the method is repeated from the step of soft programming with the second bias voltage. When the selected unit is the last memory unit, the memory array is bit-by-bit soft programmed with a third bias voltage.