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Abstract

A page of non-volatile multi-level memory cells on a word line is sensed in parallel by sense amps via bit lines. A predetermined input sensing voltage as an increasing function of time applied to the word line allows scanning of the entire range of thresholds of the memory cell in one sweep. Sensing of the thresholds of individual cells is then reduced to a time-domain sensing by noting the times the individual cells become conducting. Each conducting time, adjusted for delays in the word line and the bit line, can be used to derive the sensing voltage level that developed at the word line local to the cell when the cell became conducting. The locally developed sensing voltage level yields the threshold of the cell. This time-domain sensing is relative insensitive to the number of levels of a multi-level memory and therefore resolve many levels rapidly in one sweep.

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First Claim