Managing non-volatile media

• US 8,661,184 B2
• Filed: 12/18/2012
• Issued: 02/25/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 01/27/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: SanDisk Technologies LLC (Western Digital Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Fusion-IO Incorporated (Western Digital Corporation)
• Inventors: Wood, Robert, Hyun, Jea, Sun, Hairong
• Primary Examiner(s): PHAN, TRONG Q
• Application Number:
  US13/719,045
• Publication Number:
  US 20130132652A1
• Time in Patent Office: 434 Days
• Field of Search: 711/100, 711102-105, 711/114, 711/170
• US Class Current: 711/100
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/0793 Remedial or corrective actions recovery from an exception in an instruction pipeline G06F9/3861; by retry G06F11/1402; for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity H04L69/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/1068 in sector programmable memories, e.g. flash disk G06F11/1072 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/26 Functional testing
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 12/0246 in block erasable memory, e.g. flash memory
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0614 Improving the reliability of storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0629 Configuration or reconfiguration of storage systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0679 Non-volatile semiconductor memory device, e.g. flash memory, one time programmable memory [OTP]
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 11/56 using storage elements with more than two stable states represented by steps, e.g. of voltage, current, phase, frequency
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 16/00 Erasable programmable read-only memories G11C14/00 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 16/26 Sensing or reading circuits; Data output circuits
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 16/28 using differential sensing or reference cells, e.g. dummy cells
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 16/3404 Convergence or correction of memory cell threshold voltages; Repair or recovery of overerased or overprogrammed cells
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 16/3418 Disturbance prevention or evaluation; Refreshing of disturbed memory data
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 2029/0409 Online test
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/02 Detection or location of defective auxiliary circuits, e.g. defective refresh counters
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/026 in sense amplifiers
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/028 with adaption or trimming of parameters
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/42 using error correcting codes [ECC] or parity check
• CPC Class Codes: G11C 29/50016 of retention

Abstract

An apparatus, system, and method are disclosed to manage non-volatile media. A media characteristic module is configured to determine media characteristics for non-volatile media. A configuration parameter module is configured to determine different configuration parameters for different storage cell abodes and/or for different groups of pages of the non-volatile media based on the determined media characteristics. A cell configuration module is configured to use the different configuration parameters for the different storage cell abodes and/or the different groups of pages of the non-volatile media.

Claims

1. A method to manage a non-volatile medium, the method comprising:

determining, during operation, a first setting for a configuration parameter for a first set of pages of a non-volatile recording medium based on a media characteristic for the first set of pages;

determining, during operation, a second setting for the configuration parameter for a second set of pages of the non-volatile recording medium based on a media characteristic for the second set of pages; and

configuring the non-volatile recording medium to use the first setting for access to the first set of pages and the second setting for access to the second set of pages.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the media characteristic for the first set of pages comprises a bit error rate for the first set of pages and the media characteristic for the second set of pages comprises a bit error rate for the second set of pages.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the first set of pages comprises one or more lower pages of multi-level storage cells of the non-volatile recording medium and the second set of pages comprises one or more upper pages of the multi-level storage cells of the non-volatile recording medium.

4. The method of claim 3, further comprising determining a third setting for the configuration parameter for a third set of pages of the non-volatile recording medium and configuring the non-volatile recording medium to use the third setting for the third set of pages.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the third set of pages consists of one or more pages toward a first end of the upper pages of the multi-level storage cells and one or more pages toward a second end of the upper pages of the multi-level storage cells.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the first set of pages comprises one or more even pages of the non-volatile recording medium and the second set of pages comprises one or more odd pages of the non-volatile recording medium.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein determining at least one of the first setting and the second setting comprises using a current setting for the at least one of the first setting and the second setting in response to a target setting being within a threshold range of the current setting.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein determining at least one of the first setting and the second setting comprises using a default setting for the at least one of the first setting and the second setting until the non-volatile recording medium satisfies an age threshold.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising increasing a frequency of storage capacity recovery operations for the non-volatile recording medium over time such that the first and second settings for the configuration parameter are not adjusted beyond a backstop value.

10. The method of claim 1, further comprising updating the media characteristics for at least one of the first and second sets of pages in response to an update event.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein the configuration parameter comprises a parameter of the first and second sets of pages modifiable by way of an interface, the configuration parameter selected from the group comprising a read voltage, a step magnitude for an incremental step pulse programming operation, a maximum number of iterations for an incremental step pulse programming operation, a program verify threshold for a program operation, an initial bias for an incremental step pulse programming operation, a step magnitude for an incremental step pulse erase operation, a maximum number of iterations for an incremental step pulse erase operation, an erase verify threshold for an erase operation, and an initial bias for an incremental step pulse erase operation.

12. An apparatus to manage non-volatile media, the apparatus comprising:

a media characteristic module configured to determine media characteristics for non-volatile memory media;

a configuration parameter module configured to determine different voltage thresholds for different abodes of storage cells of the non-volatile memory media based on the determined media characteristics; and

a cell configuration module configured to use the different voltage thresholds for the different abodes of the storage cells to execute storage operations on the storage cells.

13. The apparatus of claim 12, further comprising an adjustment threshold module configured to use a current setting for at least one of the abodes in response to a target setting for the at least one of the abodes being within a threshold range of the current setting for the at least one of the abodes.

14. The apparatus of claim 12, further comprising a sparse adjustment module configured to use a default setting for the storage cells of the non-volatile memory media until the storage cells satisfy an age threshold.

15. The apparatus of claim 12, further comprising a backstop module configured to increase a frequency of capacity recovery operations for the storage cells of the non-volatile memory media over time such that the different voltage thresholds are not adjusted beyond a backstop value.

16. The apparatus of claim 12, further comprising a characteristic update module configured to update at least one of the media characteristics for the non-volatile memory media in response to an update event.

17. The apparatus of claim 12, further comprising a configuration update module configured to update at least one of the different voltage thresholds in response to a change in the media characteristics for the non-volatile memory media.

18. A system to manage a non-volatile medium, the system comprising:

a non-volatile storage device comprising a non-volatile storage medium;

a media characteristic repository comprising a plurality of media characteristics associated with the non-volatile storage medium;

a configuration parameter module configured to determine a first adjustment for a storage threshold for a first set of pages of the non-volatile storage medium and to determine a second adjustment for the storage threshold for a second set of pages of the non-volatile storage medium based on the plurality of media characteristics from the media characteristic repository; and

a characteristic update module configured to update one or more of the media characteristics from the media characteristic repository in response to an update event.

19. The system of claim 18, wherein the storage threshold comprises one or more of a read voltage threshold, an incremental step pulse programming parameter, and an incremental step pulse erase parameter for storage cells of the non-volatile storage medium.

20. The system of claim 18, further comprising a host device in communication with the non-volatile storage device, wherein at least a portion of one or more of the media characteristic repository, the configuration parameter module, and the characteristic update module is part of a device driver for the non-volatile storage device, the device driver installed on the host device.

21. A computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium storing computer usable program code executable to perform operations to manage non-volatile medium, the operations comprising:

referencing error rates for different storage states of storage cells of a non-volatile storage medium;

determining different storage threshold settings for the different storage states of the storage cells based on the error rates; and

using the different storage threshold settings for the different storage states of the storage cells.

22. The computer program product of claim 21, wherein the operations further comprise updating at least one of the different configuration parameters in response to a change in the error rates.

23. The computer program product of claim 21, wherein the different storage threshold settings comprise different read voltage threshold adjustments for the different storage states of the storage cells.

24. An apparatus to manage non-volatile medium, the apparatus comprising:

means for determining media characteristics for a non-volatile recording medium;

means for determining, during runtime, different configuration parameter settings for different sets of pages of the non-volatile recording medium based on the media characteristics; and

means for configuring the non-volatile recording medium to use the different configuration parameter settings for operations on the different sets of pages.

25. The apparatus of claim 24, further comprising means for using a default setting for a set of pages in response to one or more of a target setting being within a threshold range of the default setting and the set of pages failing to satisfy an age threshold.