Abstract:
A charge pump circuit comprises at least one pump stage. Said pump stage includes a capacitor (C1,C2,C3;C'1,C'2,C'3) having a first plate and a second plate. The pump stage further includes a first circuital node (N1,N3,N5;N'2,N'4,N'6) connected to the first plate, a voltage of the first circuital node is forced to a first forced voltage (GND) during a forcing phase of the charge pump operation, and a second circuital node (N2,N4,N6;N'1,N'3,N'5) connected to the second plate, a voltage of the second circuital node is forced to a second forced voltage (Vdd) during the forcing phase. The voltages of the first and the second circuital nodes are free of changing with respect to the first and to the second forced voltage, respectively, except during said forcing phase. The pump stage still further includes a first forcing circuit (110,130,150;420,440,460) associated to the first circuital node, the first forcing circuit being activable for forcing the voltage of the first circuital node to the first forced voltage during the forcing phase, and a second forcing circuit (120,140,160;410,430,450) associated to the second circuital node, the second forcing circuit being activable for forcing the voltage of the second circuital node to the second forced voltage during the forcing phase.
Abstract:
A non-volatile memory device (100) is proposed. The non-volatile memory device includes a plurality of memory cells (110) each one having a programmable threshold voltage, and means for reading (130, 140, 150) a set of selected memory cells with respect to a plurality of reference voltages, for each selected memory cell the means for reading including means for charging (Pc) a reading node (BL) associated with the selected memory cell with a charging voltage (Vc), means for biasing (130) the selected memory cell with a biasing voltage, means for connecting (120d, 120s) the charged reading node with the biased selected memory cell, and means for sensing (205) a voltage at the reading node after a predefined delay from the connection, for at least a first one of the reference voltages (V R ) the biasing voltage being a first biasing voltage equal to the first reference voltage and the delay being a common first delay (Te), wherein for at least a second one of the reference voltages (Vga) the biasing voltage is a second biasing voltage (V R ) different from the second reference voltage, and the delay is a second delay (Teg) different from the first delay.
Abstract:
A multistage circuit for regulating the charge voltage or the discharge current of a capacitance (C LOAD ) of an integrated device at a certain charge-pump generated boosted voltage is safely implemented without obliging to integrate high voltage transistor structures of type of conductivity of the same sign of the boosted voltage (high-side transistors). Another fulfilled objective is to provide a multilevel nonvolatile flash memory device comprising a boosted voltage regulator that can be entirely fabricated with a low cost nonvolatile flash memory fabrication process. Basically, the multistage circuit for regulating the charge voltage or the discharge current of a capacitance in an integrated device, comprising at least a first stage and an output stage in cascade to the first stage and coupled to the capacitance, has the first stage supplied at an unboosted power supply voltage (V DD ) of the integrated device and the output stage supplied at an unregulated charge-pump generated boosted voltage (V PUMP ) and is composed of a transistor (M NOUT ) of type of conductivity opposite to the sign of the boosted voltage and of the power supply voltage. The drain of the output stage transistor is coupled to the boosted voltage either through a resistive pull-up (R PULL-UP ) or a voltage limiter.
Abstract:
A memory (104) has one bus (112) for data, addresses, and commands. A data register (114) is coupled to the bus (112) to store the data written to and read from the memory (104), a command register is coupled to the bus for receiving memory commands, and an address register is coupled to the bus to address the memory. The memory also includes an Error Correction Code (ECC) circuit for calculating an ECC. The memory (104) is configured (168, 200, 206, 237) to be responsive to external commands for controlling the operation of the ECC circuit (140) for reading or writing of the ECC that are separate from external commands controlling reads or writes of the memory data. The memory may also include a status register that stores information regarding the passing or failing of the ECC.