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World's Thinnest Flash Memory Cell Unveiled

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the angels-stored-on-the-head-of-pin dept.

qorkfiend writes "Measuring a scant 20 nanometers across, Infineon AG's new nonvolatile flash memory cell could lead to 32 gigabit flash chips within the next few years. The cell contains a unique structure with a fin for the transistor to avoid nano-scale physical effects and uses 90% less electrons than today's memory to store data."

5 of 153 comments (clear)

  1. To get rid of any confusion... bytes v bits by Atmchicago · · Score: 4, Informative

    They say 32 gigabit, not gigabyte. So if you divide 32 by 8, that makes for 4 gigabytes. At least, that's the way I understand bit-to-byte conversion.

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    1. Re:To get rid of any confusion... bytes v bits by Artraze · · Score: 2, Informative

      But those are cards, not chips. Most flash cards use 256MB chips, with two 512MB, and four for 1GB. The 4GB cards almost certainly use at least 4 chips, so cards with these newer ones could be over 16GB.

  2. Re:90% less = 81% lesspower too? by Nitish · · Score: 2, Informative

    If there is 90% less current, there is a 99% saving in Power, not 19%. The new current is 0.1I, so the new power is (0.1 I)^2 R = 0.01 I^2R
    I'm not sure that 90% less electrons immediately leads to 90% less current, though. Everything else being equal, this is true, but perhaps other factors have changed as well.

  3. Re:Increased susceptibility to quantum effects? by dsginter · · Score: 2, Informative

    Does this mean less resiliency/redundancy in the chip?

    Yes - this is the primary reason that Intel is moving to OUM after the 45nm node (slide #32). Do note that this is still years off. OUM is rad-hard.

    Also note that the research which is poured into XY-addressable OUM/chalcogenide memory can be potentially useful for the seek and scan memory that is also mentioned in that Intel presentation. My guess is that they'll come out with at leaset one variation or possibly both. The chalgogenide material is the same stuff used for RW optical media - you can change the phase via the application of energy (electrical, optical or otherwise). The change in phase causes many of the properties of the material to change, delineating unique, detectable states.

    The probe storage is similar to a CD-RW but, instead of spinning the media below a single optical read/write mechanism, they are moving the media beneath thousands of atomic resolution probes that read/write with electrical energy. It is quite the technology.

    HP says to expect it by 2006. Wow!

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  4. Wear distribution by vlad_petric · · Score: 2, Informative
    Current flash cards that are used for consumer electronic products employ controllers that do wear distribution. Without such controllers, the FAT filesystem would kill them really fast.

    For "raw flash" a filesystem designed with wear distribution in mind is JFFS2.

    And yeah, I concur with tmpfs for /tmp. I'd make it default for all distros.

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