Hybrid-hdd with multiple caching modes

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016299850-A1
Application number	US-201514681392-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Apr 8, 2015
Priority date	Apr 8, 2015
Publication date	Oct 13, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

Data is stored in a hybrid HDD that includes a magnetic storage medium and a nonvolatile solid-state device according to multiple modes of operation: a full caching mode, a transitional caching mode, and an HDD only mode. The mode of operation may be selected based on the current condition or performance of individual storage regions in a nonvolatile solid-state device of the hybrid HDD, or on the current condition or performance of the nonvolatile solid-state device as a whole. As the nonvolatile solid-state device undergoes wear, performance of the hybrid HDD is maintained by using less reliable memory blocks in the nonvolatile solid-state device as a read cache, even when these memory blocks are considered too unreliable to store dirty data.

First claim

We claim:

1 . A data storage device comprising:
a nonvolatile solid-state storage device; a magnetic storage device; and a controller configured to store data in the data storage device according to one of a first mode of operation, a second mode of operation, and a third mode of operation, wherein the controller in the first mode of operation stores data associated with a command received from a host in a particular region of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device, wherein the controller in the second mode of operation stores data associated with a first command received from the host in the particular region when the data associated with the first command are stored in the magnetic storage device, and does not store data associated with a second command received from the host in the particular region when the data associated with the second command are not stored in the magnetic storage device, and wherein the controller in the third mode of operation stores no data associated with a command received from the host in the particular region.

2 . The data storage device of claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to store data in the particular region according to the second mode of operation after a program/erase cycle count of the particular region exceeds a first threshold value.

3 . The data storage device of claim 2 , wherein the controller is configured to store no data in the particular region according to the third mode of operation after a program/erase cycle count of the particular region exceeds a second threshold value, the second threshold value being greater than the first threshold value.

4 . The data storage device of claim 2 , wherein the controller is configured to store data in the particular region according to the third mode of operation when a program/erase cycle count of the particular region exceeds the first threshold value.

5 . The data storage device of claim 2 , wherein the controller is configured to store data in an additional region of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device according to the first mode of operation when a program/erase cycle count of the additional region is less than the first threshold value.

6 . The data storage device of claim 2 , wherein the controller is configured to store data in any of a plurality of regions of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device according to the second mode of operation and to store no data in the nonvolatile solid-state storage device according to the first mode of operation.

7 . The data storage device of claim 1 , wherein the controller is configured to store data in the particular region according to the second mode of operation when an average program/erase cycle count of a plurality of regions of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device exceeds a first threshold value.

8 . The data storage device of claim 7 , wherein the controller is configured to:
track a performance metric of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device when storing data received from the host in the plurality of regions according to the second mode of operation; and store data associated with a command received from the host according to the third mode of operation when the performance metric indicates that reading data associated with a read command from the magnetic storage device is faster than reading the data associated with the read command from the particular region.

9 . The data storage device of claim 8 , wherein the performance metric is based on at least one of an average read error rate associated with reading data from the in the particular region and an average error correction time.

10 . The data storage device of claim 1 , wherein the first command and the second command each include a read command or a write command.

11 . A data storage device comprising:
a nonvolatile solid-state storage device; a magnetic storage device; and a controller configured to store data in the data storage device according to one of a first mode of operation, a second mode of operation, and a third mode of operation, the controller changing between modes of operations based on program/erase cycle counts of blocks of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device.

12 . A method of storing data in data storage device that includes a nonvolatile solid-state device and a magnetic storage medium, the method comprising:
storing data in the data storage device according to one of a first mode of operation, a second mode of operation, and a third mode of operation, wherein the first mode of operation includes storing data associated with a command received from a host in a particular region of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device, wherein the second mode of operation includes storing data associated with a first command received from the host in the particular region when the data associated with the first command are stored in the magnetic storage device, and does not include storing data associated with a second command received from the host in the particular region when the data associated with the second command are not stored in the magnetic storage device, and wherein the third mode of operation includes storing no data associated with a command received from the host in the particular region.

13 . The method of claim 12 further comprising storing data in the particular region according to the second mode of operation after a program/erase cycle count of the particular region exceeds a first threshold value.

14 . The method of claim 13 , further comprising storing no data in the particular region according to the third mode of operation after a program/erase cycle count of the particular region exceeds a second threshold value, the second threshold value being greater than the first threshold value.

15 . The method of claim 13 , further comprising storing data in the particular region according to the third mode of operation when a program/erase cycle count of the particular region exceeds the first threshold value.

16 . The method of claim 13 , further comprising storing data in an additional region of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device according to the first mode of operation when a program/erase cycle count of the additional region is less than the first threshold value.

17 . The method of claim 12 , further comprising storing data in the particular region according to the second mode of operation when an average program/erase cycle count of a plurality of regions of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device exceeds a first threshold value.

18 . The method of claim 17 , further comprising:
tracking a performance metric of the nonvolatile solid-state storage device when storing data received from the host in the plurality of regions according to the second mode of operation; and storing data associated with a command received from the host according to the third mode of operation when the performance metric indicates that reading data associated with a read command from the magnetic storage device is faster than reading the data associated with the read command from the particular region.

19 . The method of claim 18 , wherein the performance metric is based on at least one of an average read error rate associated with reading data from the in the particular region and an average error correction time.

20 . The method of claim 12 , wherein the first command and the second command each include a read command or a write command.

Assignees

• Toshiba Kk

Inventors

• Budiman Mine Wonkyung
• Hall Andre C
• Dunn Eric R
• Schmidt Thorsten

Classifications

• G11C11/005

  comprising combined but independently operative RAM-ROM, RAM-PROM, RAM-EPROM cells · CPC title

• G11C16/00

  Erasable programmable read-only memories (G11C14/00 takes precedence) · CPC title

• G06F3/068

  Hybrid storage device · CPC title

• G06F12/0638 Primary

  Combination of memories, e.g. ROM and RAM such as to permit replacement or supplementing of words in one module by words in another module (address formation of the next microinstruction G06F9/26; masking faults in memories by using spares or by reconfiguring G11C29/70) · CPC title

• G06F13/16

  for access to memory bus (G06F13/28 takes precedence) · CPC title