IBM announces computer memory breakthrough
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IBM Thursday announced a breakthrough in computer memory technology, which may lead to the development of solid-state chips that can store as much data as NAND flash technology but with 100 times the performance and vastly greater lifespan.
Currently, NAND flash memory products, such as SSDs, have write rates as high as 2Gbps .
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IBM said it has produced phase-change memory (PCM) chips that can store two bits of data per cell without data corruption problems, something that has plagued PCM development from the start.
Like NAND flash memory, which is used in solid state drives (SSDs) and is embedded in computers like Apple's MacBook Air, PCM is nonvolatile -- meaning it retains data after its power supply is shut down.
Unlike NAND flash, PCM memory does not require that existing data be marked for deletion prior to new data being written to it -- a process known to as an erase-write cycle. Erase-write cycles slow NAND flash performance and, over time, wear it out, giving it a lifespan that ranges from 5,000 to 10,000 write cycles in consumer products and up to 100,000 cycles in enterprise-class products.
PCM can sustain up to 5 million write cycles, according to IBM.
"If you can write to flash 3,000 times, that will outlive most cell phones and MP3 players, but that's certainly not good enough for the enterprise that does that in an hour," said Christopher Sciacca, manager of communications for IBM Research in Zurich.
As organizations and consumers increasingly embrace cloud-computing models and services, ever more powerful and efficient, yet affordable storage technologies are needed, according to Haris Pozidis, manager of memory and probe technologies at IBM Research.
Project-Blowing Your Own Eprom « Your Computer Online
John Dawson reveals how you can program EPROMs in the comfort of your own home using commercial devices or by building your own.
When Robert Heinlein wrote The Door into Summer he described Programmable Read Only Memories (PROMs) in these words:
Here is where the Thorsen memory tubes came in . . . No need to go into the theory of an electronic tube that even Bell Labs doesn’t understand too well. The point is that you can hook a Thorsen tube into a control circuit, direct the machine through an operation by remote control, and the tube will “remember” what was done and can direct the operation without a human supervisor a second time, or any number of times . .. Frank’s square head could easily hold a hundred Thorsen tubes, each with an electronic memory of a different household task.
Not bad for 1957. Read Only Memories (ROMs) have progressed enormously in the last four or five years. Prices have dropped, capacity has increased and, most important of all, the ease with which you can program and subsequently change a program in one of these devices has altered out of all recognition.
A ROM is an integrated circuit into which a certain bit pattern has been built at the time of its manufacture. The program is inserted by means of a photo-mask for each circuit layer; this is an expensive process unless the maker intends to produce several thousand chips.
For a smaller number of ROMs it is usually economical for an equipment manufacturer to buy Programmable Read Only Memory (PROM) chips. These have a fusible link in each cell and the bit pattern can be set in the chip once and for all by blowing selected fuses to create open circuits where required. The information stored in the PROM can be changed only by blowing more fuses, and creating more “on” states in the bit pattern.
Eventually, having started with a device set completely to off states, you would end up with the opposite — a chip full of on states. Both of these methods were fine once a manufacturer was in full-scale production but of little use in a research-and-development laboratory.
One type of ROM can be reprogrammed during operation in the computer; however, Electrically Alterable Read Only Memo v chips are slow and still expensive. An EPROM-like device is CMOS Random Access Memory which is now available with small lithium batteries built on to the chip to keep the program contents of the integrated circuits intact when the main power to the computer is switched off. Like the EAROM this is still an expensive method of maintaining a program but it has many advantages and is likely to follow most other pieces of hardware in becoming very much cheaper. The most common ROM chips are now EPROMs.
Eprom Erasing Time - Bookshelf
Electronic design
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Further, an addition voltage Vpp signal is needed when erase and write occurs at the EEPROM The number of times an EEPROM can be ...Introduction To Microprocessor
This time is quite small as compared to time required to erase EPROM, and it can be erased and reprogrammed with device right in the circuit. ...Memory systems design and applications, selected from Electronic design
EPROM erase times vary considerably, so choose an erase interval that will let you observe bits dropping out over at least four intervals. ...The electronics handbook
Furthermore, even a few minutes of erase time is intolerable. For this reason, an erasable PROM was designed called electrical erasable PROM (EEPROM). ...Helpful Articles Directory
UV EPROM Erasing Equipment - Wafer Erasing Equipment
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Erasing time based on 6W-sec/cm2 EPROM at nominal initial short-wave UV intensity of 30, ... Erasing time based on 6W-sec/cm2 EPROM at nominal initial short-wave ...
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Once programmed, an EPROM can be erased by exposing it to strong ultraviolet light from a ... memory array is exposed, all the memory is erased at the same time. ...
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