Buffer optimization for solid-state drives

Abstract

A solid-state drive having an integrated circuit comprising a controller that is configured to determine, for data transferred between a host interface of the integrated circuit and nonvolatile semiconductor storage device interface of the integrated circuit, the availability of an internal buffer of the integrated circuit to transparently accumulate the transferred data, and (i) if the internal buffer is available, accumulate the data from target nonvolatile semiconductor storage devices or the host in the internal buffer, or (ii) if the internal buffer is not available, accumulate the data unit from the target nonvolatile semiconductor storage devices or the host in an external buffer communicatively coupled to the controller, wherein the external buffer is external to the integrated circuit. The controller then provides the accumulated data to the respective interfaces to furnish a read or write request from the host.

1 . An integrated circuit system comprising:
 an integrated circuit;   a memory controller;   an internal buffer internal to the integrated circuit and communicatively coupled to the memory controller; and   an external buffer external to the integrated circuit and communicatively coupled to the memory controller,   wherein the memory controller is configured to
 receive a request to write data to an available buffer, the data being segmented into a plurality of data units, 
 determine, for each data unit of the plurality of data units, availability of the internal buffer to temporarily store the data unit, 
 if the internal buffer is available, write the data unit to the internal buffer without writing to the external buffer, and 
 if the internal buffer is not available, write the data unit to the external buffer without writing the data unit to the internal buffer.