EEVblog Electronics Community Forum
General => General Technical Chat => Topic started by: msuffidy on November 11, 2023, 03:50:47 am
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If your firmware or BIOS is on flash, does the data risk eventually draining out to the discharge state?
Is NOR better than NAND regarding this?
Is there any difference between EEPROM and flash?
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Eventually, data on a Flash chip might be lost, depending on a number of factors, including the number of write/erase cycles the memory has been subject to. I think (but not 100% sure) that NOR has better retention than NAND, in that it's less susceptible to random bit flips. Manufacturers usually specify data retention in their datasheets (typically 10 years or longer for most modern parts).
Flash is a descendant of EEPROMs… for more information, Google is your friend :) (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_memory).
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Of course, and data retention lifetime is one of the key parameters to the point of being sometimes mentioned on the very first front page of a microcontroller.