Patent Application
20250168993
Embodiments of the invention may relate generally to electronic devices such as solid-state storage devices, and particularly to an enhanced prying structure for opening such devices.
Enterprise solid-state storage devices, or solid-state drives (SSDs), are commonly used in client, hyperscale and enterprise compute environments. Since SSDs are made from flash memory (e.g., NAND (NOT AND) flash memory), they can be built in many different form factors and are typically associated with industry standard form factors and corresponding specifications and protocols. For example, a family of specifications referred to as Enterprise and Datacenter Standard Form Factor (EDSFF) were developed to address the concerns of data center storage. For example, EDSFF E3 is a family of form factors designed to update and replace the traditional U.2 2.5-inch form factor in servers and storage systems, and were largely designed for future servers and storage systems. The primary usage of E3 is for SSDs and/or storage class memory, but E3 is big enough to accommodate a broader range of device types (for non-limiting examples, accelerators or network interface cards).
Any approaches that may be described in this section are approaches that could be pursued, but not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated, it should not be assumed that any of the approaches described in this section qualify as prior art merely by virtue of their inclusion in this section.
Embodiments are illustrated by way of example, and not by way of limitation, in the figures of the accompanying drawings and in which like reference numerals refer to similar elements and in which:
Generally, approaches to an enhanced prying structure for electronic devices are described. In the following description, for the purposes of explanation, numerous specific details are set forth to provide a thorough understanding of the embodiments of the invention described herein. It will be apparent, however, that the embodiments of the invention described herein may be practiced without these specific details. In other instances, well-known structures and devices may be shown in block diagram form to avoid unnecessarily obscuring the embodiments of the invention described herein.
References herein to “an embodiment”, “one embodiment”, and the like, are intended to mean that the particular feature, structure, or characteristic being described is included in at least one embodiment of the invention. However, instances of such phrases do not necessarily all refer to the same embodiment,
The term “substantially” will be understood to describe a feature that is largely or nearly structured, configured, dimensioned, etc., but with which manufacturing tolerances and the like may in practice result in a situation in which the structure, configuration, dimension, etc. is not always or necessarily precisely as stated. For example, describing a structure as “substantially vertical” would assign that term its plain meaning, such that the sidewall is vertical for all practical purposes but may not be precisely at 90 degrees throughout.
While terms such as “optimal”, “optimize”, “minimal”, “minimize”, “maximal”, “maximize”, and the like may not have certain values associated therewith, if such terms are used herein the intent is that one of ordinary skill in the art would understand such terms to include affecting a value, parameter, metric, and the like in a beneficial direction consistent with the totality of this disclosure. For example, describing a value of something as “minimal” does not require that the value actually be equal to some theoretical minimum (e.g., zero), but should be understood in a practical sense in that a corresponding goal would be to move the value in a beneficial direction toward a theoretical minimum.
Recall that enterprise storage solutions such as solid-state drives (SSDs) are commonly used in client, hyperscale and enterprise compute environments. These device structures are often configured with prying holes/openings for use in opening a device assembly, i.e., for prying open an enclosure cover from its corresponding base, such as during manufacturing and testing and/or for field use. Such prying openings can cause critical ESD (electrostatic discharge) performance degradation, whereby electrical discharge energy can flow into big openings and shock the electronic components and the system generally. ESD, sometimes referred to as “static electricity”, is a momentary flow of electrical current between two differently-charged objects when brought into contact or even when brought close together. It is well-known that ESD can cause damage to and even failure of solid-state electronics components such as integrated circuits, which can suffer permanent damage when subjected to high voltages. Thus, sensitive components need to be protected during and after manufacture, during shipping and device assembly, and in the finished device.
According to an embodiment, electronic device 300 comprises an enclosure base 302 (or “bottom part”) comprising a prying opening 302p, configured to receive a prying tool, in at least one sidewall 302s of the base 302. Depicted here are two prying openings 302p, one near each end of the sidewall 302s, according to an embodiment. Similarly, according to an embodiment there may be one or more prying openings 302p on the base 302 sidewall opposing sidewall 302s (see, e.g.,
According to an embodiment, electronic device 300 further comprises an enclosure cover 304 (or “top part”) coupled with the base 302, with the cover 304 comprising a stepped structure 304p (see, e.g.,
According to an embodiment and as depicted, the stepped structure 304p of the cover 304 comprises a plurality of steps, depicted here as step 304p-1, 304p-2, 304p-3 up to 304p-n, where n represents an arbitrary number of steps (here, four) that may vary from implementation to implementation. Also according to an embodiment and as depicted, the stepped structure 304p of the cover 304 comprises a plurality of steps 304p-1 through 304p-n progressively farther from the sidewall 302s of the base 302 in a direction into the base 302. Each of these embodiments facilitates the prying function, which is illustrated and described in more detail in reference to
According to an embodiment and as depicted, the cover 304 further comprises a surface 305 beyond the prying opening 302p of the base 302 in the direction into the base 302, the surface 305 forming a narrow pathway with the sidewall 302s of the base 302. See also surface 605 of
According to an embodiment, electronic device 600 comprises an enclosure base 602 (or “bottom part”) comprising a prying opening 602p, configured to receive a prying tool, in at least one sidewall 602s of the base 602. Similarly, according to an embodiment there may be one or more prying openings 602p on the base 602 sidewall opposing sidewall 602s, or any other sidewall of the base 602. As such, the number and location of prying openings 602p constituent to a given base such as base 602 may vary from implementation to implementation based, for example, on mechanical configurations, design goals and constraints, industry standards and/or specifications, and the like. Typically, PCBs constituent to electronic device 600 are coupled with the base 602.
According to an embodiment, electronic device 600 further comprises an enclosure cover 604 (or “top part”) coupled with the base 602, with the cover 604 comprising a stepped structure 604p, extending along a cover 604 sidewall 604s disposed within the base 602, positioned at least in part adjacent with the prying opening 602p of the base 602. By contrast with cover 304 of electronic device 300, whose main top covering portion 304t (
At block 702, a printed circuit board (PCB) is coupled to an enclosure base comprising a prying opening in at least one sidewall of the base. For example, a PCB corresponding to the components of SSD 152 (e.g., interface 160 through volatile memory 172 of
At block 704, a cover covering the PCB is coupled to the base, the cover comprising a stepped structure extending along a cover sidewall disposed within the base and positioned at least in part adjacent with the prying opening of the base. For example, cover 304 (
As described throughout herein, for an electronic device such as an SSD, implementation of a prying opening in a sidewall of an enclosure base, and positioned adjacent to a corresponding stepped structure along a sidewall of an enclosure cover, enables an effective prying mechanism enabling the disassembling of the electronic device. Furthermore, a stepped structure surface extending beyond the prying opening of the base forms a narrow pathway with the sidewall of the base, thus providing a structural mechanism to inhibit the transfer of ESD to the sensitive components (e.g., of a PCB) of the device.
Embodiments may be used in the context of electronic devices including digital data storage devices (DSDs), such as a solid-state drives (SSDs). Thus,
Host 154 broadly represents any type of computing hardware, software, or firmware (or any combination of the foregoing) that makes, among others, data I/O requests or calls to one or more memory device. For example, host 154 may be an operating system executing on a computer, a tablet, a mobile phone, or generally any type of computing device that contains or interacts with storage memory. The primary interface 156 coupling host 154 to SSD 152 may be, for example, a storage system's internal bus or a communication cable or a wireless communication link, or the like.
The example SSD 152 illustrated in
Interface 160 is a point of interaction between components, namely SSD 152 and host 154 in this context, and is applicable at the level of both hardware and software. This enables a component to communicate with other components via an input/output (IO) system and an associated protocol. A hardware interface is typically described by the mechanical, electrical and logical signals at the interface and the protocol for sequencing them. Some non-limiting examples of common and standard interfaces include SCSI (Small Computer System Interface), SAS (Serial Attached SCSI), and SATA (Serial ATA).
An SSD 152 includes a controller 162, which incorporates the electronics that bridge the non-volatile memory components (e.g., NAND flash) to the host, such as non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n to host 154. The controller is typically an embedded processor that executes firmware-level code and can be a significant factor in SSD performance.
Controller 162 interfaces with non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n via an addressing 164 function block. The addressing 164 function operates, for example, to manage mappings between logical block addresses (LBAs) from the host 154 to a corresponding physical block address on the SSD 152, namely, on the non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n of SSD 152. Because the non-volatile memory page and the host sectors are different sizes, an SSD has to build and maintain a data structure that enables it to translate between the host writing data to or reading data from a sector, and the physical non-volatile memory page on which that data is actually placed. This table structure or “mapping” may be built and maintained for a session in the SSD's volatile memory 172, such as DRAM or some other local volatile memory component accessible to controller 162 and addressing 164. Alternatively, the table structure may be maintained more persistently across sessions in the SSD's non-volatile memory such as non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n.
Addressing 164 interacts with data buffer cache 166, in addition to non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n. Data buffer cache 166 of an SSD 152 typically uses DRAM as a cache, similar to the cache in hard disk drives. Data buffer cache 166 serves as a buffer or staging area for the transmission of data to and from the non-volatile memory components, as well as serves as a cache for speeding up future requests for the cached data. Data buffer cache 166 is typically implemented with volatile memory so the data stored therein is not permanently stored in the cache, i.e., the data is not persistent.
Finally, SSD 152 includes the one or more non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n components. For a non-limiting example, the non-volatile memory components 170a, 170b-170n may be implemented as flash memory (e.g., NAND or NOR flash), or other types of solid-state memory available now or in the future. The non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n components are the actual memory electronic components on which data is persistently stored. The non-volatile memory 170a, 170b-170n components of SSD 152 can be considered the analogue to the hard disks in hard-disk drive (HDD) storage devices.
Furthermore, references herein to a data storage device may encompass a multi-medium storage device (or “multi-medium device”, which may at times be referred to as a “multi-tier device” or “hybrid drive”). A multi-medium storage device refers generally to a storage device having functionality of both a traditional HDD (see, e.g., HDD 100) combined with an SSD (see, e.g., SSD 150) using non-volatile memory, such as flash or other solid-state (e.g., integrated circuits) memory, which is electrically erasable and programmable. As operation, management and control of the different types of storage media typically differ, the solid-state portion of a hybrid drive may include its own corresponding controller functionality, which may be integrated into a single controller along with the HDD functionality. A multi-medium storage device may be architected and configured to operate and to utilize the solid-state portion in a number of ways, such as, for non-limiting examples, by using the solid-state memory as cache memory, for storing frequently-accessed data, for storing I/O intensive data, for storing metadata corresponding to payload data (e.g., for assisting with decoding the payload data), and the like. Further, a multi-medium storage device may be architected and configured essentially as two storage devices in a single enclosure, i.e., a traditional HDD and an SSD, with either one or multiple interfaces for host connection.
In the foregoing description, embodiments of the invention have been described with reference to numerous specific details that may vary from implementation to implementation. Therefore, various modifications and changes may be made thereto without departing from the broader spirit and scope of the embodiments. Thus, the sole and exclusive indicator of what is the invention, and is intended by the applicants to be the invention, is the set of claims that issue from this application, in the specific form in which such claims issue, including any subsequent correction. Any definitions expressly set forth herein for terms contained in such claims shall govern the meaning of such terms as used in the claims. Hence, no limitation, element, property, feature, advantage or attribute that is not expressly recited in a claim should limit the scope of such claim in any way. The specification and drawings are, accordingly, to be regarded in an illustrative rather than a restrictive sense.
In addition, in this description certain process steps may be set forth in a particular order, and alphabetic and alphanumeric labels may be used to identify certain steps. Unless specifically stated in the description, embodiments are not necessarily limited to any particular order of carrying out such steps. In particular, the labels are used merely for convenient identification of steps, and are not intended to specify or require a particular order of carrying out such steps.
