This application claims the priority benefit of Taiwan application serial no. 103139200, filed on Nov. 12, 2014. The entirety of the above-mentioned patent application is hereby incorporated by reference herein and made a part of this specification.
The present disclosure is related to a fault-tolerance through silicon via interface and the corresponding controlling method.
Three-dimensional (3-D) integration is one of important technologies for future integrated circuit design. Semiconductor chips are stacked together and their signals are connected vertically using through silicon vias (TSVs). Comparing with packaging technologies that rely on bond wires, such as system in package (SiP), TSVs provide shorter interconnections between stacked chips, with lower power consumption and higher signal transmission speed. Since TSVs have a much finer pitch than that of bond wires used in SiP, the limitation in available interconnections and the data transmission bottleneck in SiP can be alleviated.
Three-dimensional (3-D) integration technology has been widely used, especially in memory related designs to increase the storage capacity. Three-dimensional random access memory (3-D RAM), which vertically stacks a plurality of memory chips, could apply the TSV interface to access the data of its memory arrays from outside.
With high data bandwidth and large storage capacity targeting at high-performance computing, manufacturing yield becomes a critical issue to make the 3-D RAM practical and mass producible. Comparing with traditional two-dimensional random access memory (2-D RAM) design, the 3-D RAM requires more considerations to sustain a high yield rate. A large number of TSV paths connect the data, address, command, and control signals of the stacked chips from the bottom layer to the top. To guarantee the operations of 3-D RAM, not only each layer of the stacked chips should work properly, but also the TSV paths among layers should be fault-free.
In one of the exemplary embodiments, the present disclosure is directed to a fault-tolerance through silicon via (TSV) interface. The interface is disposed in a three-dimensional random access memory (3-D RAM) with N memory layers and M data access path sets, and each of the memory layers includes K memory arrays, and each of the data access path sets includes a plurality of TSV paths connecting to the memory layers. The fault-tolerance TSV interface includes a path controlling unit and a processing unit. The path controlling unit detects and controls the data access path sets. When a fault occurs in one of the data access path sets, the processing unit provides at least two different access configurations to tolerate the fault. In each of the access configurations, μ out of M data access path sets, where 0<μ<M, are enabled to access one of the corresponding memory layers with all K memory arrays.
In one of the exemplary embodiments, the present disclosure is directed to a fault-tolerance TSV interface controlling method. The method provides a 3-D RAM with N memory layers and M data access path sets, and each of the memory layers includes K memory arrays, and each of the data access path sets includes a plurality of TSV paths connecting to the memory layers. The fault-tolerance TSV interface is disposed on each of the memory layers. The method provides at least two different access configurations for the purpose of fault tolerance. In each of the access configurations, μ out of M data access path sets, where 0<μ<M, are enabled to access one of the corresponding memory layers with all K memory arrays.
In one of the exemplary embodiments, the present disclosure is directed to a fault-tolerance TSV interface controlling method. The method provides a 3-D RAM with N memory layers and M data access path sets, and each of the memory layers includes K memory arrays, and each of the data access path sets includes a plurality of TSV paths connecting to the memory layers. The method provides at least two different fault-tolerance access configurations, wherein the access of the memory layers is through a proper arrangement of the access configurations to avoid the fault.
In order to make the aforementioned features and advantages of the present disclosure comprehensible, exemplary embodiments accompanied with figures are described in detail below. It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary, and are intended to provide further explanation of the disclosure as claimed.
It should be understood, however, that this summary may not contain all of the aspect and embodiments of the present disclosure and is therefore not meant to be limiting or restrictive in any manner. Also the present disclosure would include improvements and modifications which are obvious to one skilled in the art.
The accompanying drawings are included to provide a further understanding of the disclosure, and are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification. The drawings illustrate embodiments of the disclosure and, together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the disclosure.
When the path controlling unit 110 located in a memory layer detects is a fault among the data access path sets DAPS1, DAPS2, . . . , DAPSM, adopting normal access configurations fails to maintain a full robust data width to the memory array MA1, MA2, . . . , MAK in the memory layer of the 3-D RAM. In our exemplary embodiment, the processing unit 120 located in each memory layer provides a proper arrangement of fault-tolerance access configurations to access memory arrays MA1, MA2, . . . , MAK in memory layers ML1, ML2, . . . , MLN when a fault exists among the data access path sets DAPS1, DAPS2, . . . , DAPSM.
When the path controlling unit 110 detects any fault in the data access path sets DAPS1, DAPS2, DAPS3, and DAPS4, the processing unit 120 provides fault-tolerance access configurations C010, C011, C100, C101, C110 and C111 to support data access for the 3-D RAM. In
In fault-tolerance access configuration C010, the path controlling unit 110 enables two data access path sets DAPS1 and DAPS3 indicated by the solid circles and disables two data access path sets DAPS2 and DAPS4 indicated by the dashed circles. The path controlling unit 110 and the memory controlling unit 130 select DAPS1 to access memory arrays MA1 and MA2, and DAPS3 to access memory arrays MA3 and MA4, by the address sequence is indexed by numbers 0, 1, . . . , 7. The same indices inside the memory arrays indicate the physical locations being accessed at the same time.
In fault-tolerance access configuration C011, the path controlling unit 110 enables two data access path sets DAPS2 and DAPS4 indicated by the solid circles and disables two data access path sets DAPS1 and DAPS3 indicated by the dashed circles. The path controlling unit 110 and the memory controlling unit 130 select DAPS2 to access memory arrays MA2 and MA1, and DAPS4 to access memory arrays MA4 and MA3, by the address sequence indexed by numbers 0, 1, . . . , 7. The same indices inside the memory arrays indicate the physical locations being accessed at the same time.
In fault-tolerance access configuration C100, the path controlling unit 110 enables a data access path set DAPS1 indicated by a solid circle and disables three data access path sets DAPS2, DAPS3, and DAPS4 indicated by dashed circles. The path controlling unit 110 and the memory controlling unit 130 select DAPS1 to access memory arrays MA1, MA2, MA3, and MA4, by the address sequence indexed by numbers 0, 1, . . . , 15.
In fault-tolerance access configuration C101, the path controlling unit 110 enables a data access path set DAPS2 indicated by a solid circle and disables three data access path sets DAPS1, DAPS3, and DAPS4 indicated by dashed circles. The path controlling unit 110 and the memory controlling unit 130 select DAPS2 to access memory arrays MA2, MA1, MA4, and MA3, by the address sequence indexed by numbers 0, 1, . . . , 15.
In fault-tolerance access configuration C110, the path controlling unit 110 enables a data access path set DAPS3 indicated by a solid circle and disables three data access path sets DAPS1, DAPS2, and DAPS4 indicated by dashed circles. The path controlling unit 110 and the memory controlling unit 130 select DAPS3 to access memory arrays MA3, MA4, MA1, and MA2, by the address sequence indexed by numbers 0, 1, . . . , 15.
In fault-tolerance access configuration C111, the path controlling unit 110 enables a data access path set DAPS4 indicated by a solid circle and disables three data access path sets DAPS1, DAPS2, and DAPS3 indicated by dashed circles. The path controlling unit 110 and the memory controlling unit 130 select DAPS4 to access memory arrays MA4, MA3, MA2, and MA1, by the address sequence indexed by numbers 0, 1, . . . , 15.
In
In
As shown on the right of
As shown on the left of
Through the above setting, the fault occurring in the data access path set DAPS3 is avoided. There is no need to equip any redundant TSV for memory layers ML1 and ML2, as ML1 is accessed by DAPS2 and DAPS4, while ML2 is accessed by DAPS1 and DAPS3. All data access path sets DAPS1, DAPS2, DAPS3, and DAPS4 are active concurrently, and thus, a full data width of the 3-D RAM can still be maintained. If the fault occurs in the other data access path set, a similar setting can be operated accordingly.
In
As shown on the upper right of
As shown on the upper left of
As shown on the lower right of
As shown on the lower left of
Through the above setting, the two faults occurring in data access path sets DAPS1 and DAPS3 are avoided. There is no need to equip any redundant TSV for memory layers ML1, ML2, ML3, and ML4. The four memory layers ML1, ML2, ML3, and ML4 are accessed at the same time, respectively, by data access path sets DAPS4, DAPS2, DAPS1, and DAPS3. Thus, a full data width of the 3-D RAM can still be maintained. If two faults occur in other pairs of data access path sets, such as DAPS1 and DAPS2, a similar setting can be operated accordingly.
In
As shown on the upper right of
As shown on the lower left of
Through the above setting, the two faults occurring in data access path sets DAPS1 and DAPS3 are avoided. There is no need to equip any redundant TSV for memory layers ML1 and ML4. The two memory layers ML1 and ML4 are accessed at the same time, respectively, by data access path sets DAPS2, DAPS4 and DAPS1, DAPS3. Thus, a full data width of the 3-D RAM can still be maintained.
In
As shown on the upper left of
As shown on the lower right of
Through the above setting, the two faults occurring in data access path sets DAPS1 and DAPS3 are avoided. There is no need to equip any redundant TSV for memory layers ML2 and ML3. The two memory layers ML2 and ML3 are accessed at the same time, respectively, by data access path sets DAPS2, DAPS4 and DAPS1, DAPS3. Thus, a full data width of the 3-D RAM can still be maintained.
In another embodiment, the settings of
The above embodiments show concurrent accesses of two memory layers (ML1 and ML4 or ML2 and ML3) or four memory layers (ML1, ML2, ML3, ML4) in the 3-D RAM. In one embodiment, 2b memory layers are concurrently accessed by data access path sets, where b is a natural number.
It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that various modifications and variations can be made to the structure of the disclosed embodiments without departing from the scope or spirit of the disclosure. In view of the foregoing, it is intended that the disclosure cover modifications and variations of this disclosure provided they fall within the scope of the following claims and their equivalents.
Moreover, the claims should not be read as limited to the described order or elements unless stated to that effect. In addition, use of the term “means” in any claim is intended to invoke 35 U.S.C. §112, ¶6, and any claim without the word “means” is not so intended.
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