Storage capacity status

• US 8,296,545 B2
• Filed: 05/13/2011
• Issued: 10/23/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 08/27/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Micron Technology, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Micron Technology, Inc.
• Inventors: Estakhri, Petro, Furuhjelm, Martin Ragnar, Le, Ngon, Beckmann, Jerrold Allen, Galbo, Neal Anthony, Hellmold, Steffen Markus, Solomon, Jarreth Romero
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, HIEP T
• Application Number:
  US13/107,513
• Publication Number:
  US 20110219175A1
• Time in Patent Office: 529 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 711/170
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 16/20 Initialising; Data preset; Chip identification
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/88 with partially good memories

Abstract

In one embodiment of the present invention, a memory device is disclosed to include memory organized into blocks, each block having a status associated therewith and all of the blocks of the nonvolatile memory having collectively a capacity status associated therewith and a display for showing the capacity status even when no power is being applied to the display.

Claims

1. A device, that is removable from and not part of a host, having an electronic display to show a status of memory that is part of the device even when no power is being applied to the electronic display wherein the device is configured to receive a file structure maintained by the host to determine the status.

2. The device of claim 1, wherein the status comprises a capacity status.

3. The device of claim 2, wherein the capacity status comprises a remaining capacity.

4. The device of claim 2, wherein the capacity status comprises a used capacity.

5. The device of claim 1, wherein the display to show a status comprises a display to show a measure indicative of a storage capacity of the memory.

6. The device of claim 1, wherein the display to show a status comprises a display to show a number of usable blocks included within the memory.

7. The device of claim 1, wherein the display to show a status comprises a display to show an approximate number of blocks of the memory that have been programmed.

8. The device of claim 1, wherein the display to show a status comprises a display to show an approximate number of blocks of the memory that remain to be programmed.

9. The device of claim 1, wherein the display to show a status comprises a display to show a percentage of programmed blocks of the memory.

10. The device of claim 1, wherein the display to show a status comprises a display to show a percentage of available blocks of the memory.

11. The device of claim 1, wherein the status comprises a health status.

12. The device of claim 1, wherein the display is on the device.

13. A device, that is removable from and not part of a host, having an electronic display to show storage capacity information of memory that is part of the device even when no power is being applied to the electronic display wherein the device is configured to receive a file structure maintained by the host to determine the storage capacity information.

14. A system, that is removable from and not part of a host, having a display to show a status of memory that is part of the device even when no power is being applied to the display wherein the system is configured to receive a file structure maintained by the host to determine the status.

15. The system of claim 14, further comprising the host configured to communicate with the memory to provide the status.

16. The system of claim 14, wherein the host is configured to calculate the status.