Voltage negotiation in a single host multiple cards system
First Claim
1. An apparatus comprising:
- a host;
a plurality of cards connected to said host, each of said cards operating within an independent operating voltage range; and
a voltage negotiator for determining a common operating voltage range, said common operating voltage range is a common denominator of all independent operating voltage ranges of all of said cards, wherein said host communicates with said cards within said common operating voltage range.
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Accused Products
Abstract
A low cost data storage and communication system is disclosed. The low cost data storage and communication system has a host and at least one card connected to the host. A voltage negotiator located in the system for determining a common operating voltage range that is a common denominator of all independent operating voltage ranges of all of the cards connected to the system. In addition, a novel feature of partitioning the memory storages of the card is also disclosed. This feature provides the host the ability to simultaneously erase any combination of sectors in a single erase group, or any combination of the entire erase groups. Another feature feature provided by this novel method of partitioning the memory storages is the ability to write protect any combination of memory groups in the card.
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Citations
26 Claims
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1. An apparatus comprising:
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a host;
a plurality of cards connected to said host, each of said cards operating within an independent operating voltage range; and
a voltage negotiator for determining a common operating voltage range, said common operating voltage range is a common denominator of all independent operating voltage ranges of all of said cards, wherein said host communicates with said cards within said common operating voltage range. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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10. In a memory system comprising a host, a plurality of cards connected to said host, wherein data is transferred between said cards and said host, a method of determining a common operating voltage range for operating said memory system, comprising:
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each of said cards providing an independent operating voltage range to said host; and
finding a common denominator of said independent operating voltage ranges provided by said cards, said common denominator is the common voltage range. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16)
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17. A memory system comprising:
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a plurality of memory groups, each of said memory groups comprising a plurality of memory sectors, each of said memory sectors comprising a plurality of memory cells;
a plurality of group tags, each of said group tags corresponds to one of said memory groups, each of said group tags indicating whether the memory cells under the corresponding memory group are erasable; and
a plurality of sector tags, each of said sector tags corresponds to a memory sector, each of said sector tags indicating whether the memory cells under the corresponding memory sector are erasable, wherein all the memory cells belonging to one memory sector are erasable when either the corresponding sector tag or the corresponding group tag of the memory sector is set;
wherein any combination of memory sectors in a memory group can be simultaneously erased, and any combination of the memory groups can be simultaneously erased. - View Dependent Claims (18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 26)
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23. A memory system comprising:
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a plurality of memory groups, each of said memory groups comprising a plurality of memory cells;
a plurality of group tags, each of said group tags corresponding to one of said memory groups, each of said group tags indicating whether the memory cells under the corresponding memory group are write protected; and
wherein any combination of the memory groups can be write protected. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25)
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Specification