NAND Flash Architecture and Specification Trends

Transcription

1 NAND Flash Architecture and Specification Trends Michael Abraham NAND Solutions Group Architect Micron Technology, Inc. August

2 Abstract NAND Flash is quickly moving to sub-20nm lithographies, making it the fastest scaling semiconductor technology ever! What impact do these shrinks have to NAND s architecture, performance, and reliability in system solutions? Learn how to prepare for these changes and counteract some of them through improved system design. Also, take a look at innovative NAND technologies that improve performance and reliability. August

3 Topics NAND Flash Architecture Trends The Cloud and Clients Enterprise Application Requirements ECC and SSD Topologies August

4 Q1-07 Q2-07 Q3-07 Q4-07 Q1-08 Q2-08 Q3-08 Q4-08 Q1-09 Q2-09 Q3-09 Q4-09 Q1-10 Q2-10 Q3-10 Q4-10 Q1-11 Q2-11 Q3-11 Q4-11 Q1-12 Q2-12 Q3-12 Q4-12 Process Node (nm) NAND Process Migration: Shrinking Faster than Moore s Law 50nm Class nm Class 20nm Class 10 Volume Production Dates Company A Company B Company C Company D August Data based on publicly available information

5 Memory Organization Trends NAND block size is increasing Larger page sizes and more planes increase sequential throughput More pages per block reduce die size As ECC requirements increase, the spare area per NAND page is increasing Block size (B) Data Bytes per Operation Pages per Block August

6 Number of Electrons Endurance (cycles) ECC (bits) Consumer-grade NAND Flash: Endurance and ECC Trends ECC improves data retention and endurance Process shrinks lead to less electrons per floating gate To adjust for increasing RBERs, ECC is increasing exponentially to achieve equivalent UBERs ECC algorithms are transitioning from BCH to LDPC and codeword sizes are increasing 10,000 1, MLC-2 SLC 100,000 10,000 1,000 SLC Endurance SLC ECC MLC-2 Endurance MLC-2 ECC August

7 Larger Page Sizes Improve Sequential Write Performance For a fixed page size across process nodes, write throughput decreases as the NAND process shrinks NAND vendors increase the page size to compensate for slowing array performance Write throughput decreases with more bits per cell SLC MLC-2 MLC-3 Data Bytes per Operation (Page Size * # of Planes) Sequential Programming Throughput (MB/s) August

8 Block Copy Time (ms) More Pages Per Block Affect Random Write Performance As block copy time increases, random performance decreases. Key factors that impact NAND Flash random write performance 1. Number of pages per block 2. Increase of tprog 3. Increase in I/O transfer time due to larger page sizes (effect not shown below) Impact to system product random performance Some card interfaces have write timeout specs at 250ms. To improve random performance, block management algorithms manage pages or partial blocks. 32 / / 250 SLC MLC-2 MLC-3 64 / / / / / / 900 Pages per Block / tprog (typ) Block Copy Time (ms) 256 / / / August / 2000+

9 Read Latency (µs) 100% 80% 60% 40% 20% Larger Monolithic NAND Densities Increase Random Read Latencies Most applications favor read operations over write operations Most read operations are 4KB data sectors As monolithic NAND density increases, less NAND die are being used for a fixed system density As tprog increases, the latency of random 4KB sector reads becomes more variable in mixed-operation environments as the probability of needing to read from a die that is busy increases NAND Flash TAM by Density (Units) 0% Gb (32GB) 128Gb (16GB) 64Gb (8GB) 32Gb (4GB) 16Gb (2GB) 8Gb (1GB) 4Gb 2Gb 1Gb 512Mb 256Mb 128Mb 4KB Random Read Latency USA Source: isuppli 2Q12 August / / / / / 1200 tr / tprog Min Latency Max Latency 65 / 1500

10 MT/s NAND Interface Trends for High- Performance Applications Single Channel Package Dual Channel Package ONFI 1.0 ONFI 2.x ONFI 3.0 NV-SDR NV-DDR NV-DDR2 Applications Transitioned to 200MT/s interface Shifting to 400MT/s interface Packaging Typically BGA 2 channel widely available 4 channel being standardized ONFI 3.0 compatible components are available August

11 The Cloud s Impact on NAND System Architectures Cloud: Long-term Data Client: Near-term Data USA August

12 Storage Comparison Client Storage Information stored locally, on the device Consumer or SSD grade NAND Flash Cloud Storage Information stored in hosted server farms or data centers SLC or Enterprise grade NAND Flash USA August

13 Application Requirement Comparison of NAND Flash by Application Requirement Client Storage / Consumer Client Storage / SSD Grade Cloud Storage / Enterprise Grade NAND Cell MLC-2 MLC-3 MLC-2 MLC-3 SLC MLC-2 Endurance / Cycling Up to 3K Up to 3K Up to 100K (SLC) Up to 30K (MLC-2) DPM Consumer grade Better Best I/O Channel Throughput MT/s MT/s 133 MT/s 400 MT/s UBER 1E-14 Less Less Data retention at max cycling NAND Package Placements 1 year 1 year Less Typically 1 to 4 4 to 16 Up to 32 August

14 How Do Enterprise Applications Meet Enterprise Requirements? Application Requirement Higher system density More throughput Low latency reads Controller Ability to handle many NAND Flash some controllers up to 256 die Page-based block management, DRAM cache, Overprovisioning, More I/O channels, Faster I/O channels, Multiple ECC engines, Simultaneous, mixed operations DRAM cache, Use smaller monolithic NAND densities SSD/Enterprise-grade NAND Flash Lower DPM Faster I/O channel August

15 How Do Enterprise Applications Meet Enterprise Requirements? (Part 2) Application Requirement Higher endurance / reliability More consistent use over time Power within budget for parallel operations Controller Higher ECC Balanced block management to reduce write amplification and provide even wear leveling so NAND die and blocks wear evenly Block management throttles parallelism as needed SSD/Enterprise-grade NAND Flash More ECC required, Lower UBER, Higher endurance Peak power reduction August

16 ECC and Algorithms Enterprise-grade NAND requires more ECC than consumer-grade NAND Flash to achieve higher endurance and lower UBER Providing more ECC to a consumer-grade NAND Flash does not necessarily improve endurance, though it can improve data retention ECC requirements are going to increase to the point that it will be a significant amount of real estate on a multi-channel controller 1,000, , , , ,000 Logic Gates 0 BCH (t=16) BCH (t=29) BCH (t=60) RS/TCM LDPC Logic Gates August

17 How to Handle Increasing ECC? ECC is NAND Flash technology dependent and is implemented in hardware Block management and drivers are not technology dependent and can be updated in software/firmware ECC Free Solution Tightly couples ECC to the NAND technology Also covers NAND aggregation, reducing channel loading Block management performed in processor can use DRAM buffer and results in a higher performance than a fully managed solution August

18 Questions? August

19 Other Micron Presentations NAND uses in high performance platforms Tutorial A-11 Tuesday, August 21 8:30 am NAND flash architecture and specification trends Tutorial B-11 Tuesday, August 8:30 am MLC media discussion Tutorial C-11 Tuesday, August 8:30 am Next-generation storage and the mobile computing ecosystem Session 101-B Tuesday, August 8:30 am Why ECC-free NAND is the best solution for high-performance applications Session 102-A Tuesday, August 10:10 am How ONFI standards are fueling highperformance SSDs Session 102-C Tuesday, August 10:10 am The need for differentiated MLC solutions Tutorial F-21 Wednesday, August 22 8:30 am Virtualized SSD storage for enterprise systems Tutorial H-22 Wednesday, August 22 4:30 pm Performance trade-offs of flash-based client storage solutions Tutorial A-31 Thursday, August 23 8:30 am Phase Change Memory Panel Discussion Session 302-D Thursday, August 23 9:50 am 2.5-inch PCIe interface for enterprise flash cache Panel Discussion Session 303-B Thursday, August 23 3:10 pm

20 About Michael Abraham Architect in the NAND Solutions Group at Micron Covers advanced NAND and PCM interfaces and system solutions IEEE Senior Member BS degree in Computer Engineering from Brigham Young University Micron Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Products are warranted only to meet Micron s production data sheet specifications. Information, products and/or specifications are subject to change without notice. All information is provided on an AS IS basis without warranties of any kind. Dates are estimates only. Drawings not to scale. Micron and the Micron logo are trademarks of Micron Technology, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. August