Abstract: A method of wear leveling for a non-volatile memory is performed as follows. First, the non-volatile memory is divided into a plurality of zones including at least a first zone and a second zone. The first zone is written and/or erased in which one or more logical blocks have higher writing hit rate, and therefore the corresponding physical blocks in the first zone will be written more often. The next step is to find one or more free physical blocks in second zone. The physical blocks of the first zone are replaced by the physical blocks of the second zone if the number of write and/or erase to the first zone exceeds a threshold number. The replacement of physical blocks in the first zone by the physical blocks in the second zone may include the steps of copying data from the physical blocks in the first zone to the physical block in the second zone, and changing the pointer of logical blocks to point to the physical blocks in the second zone.

Abstract: An adaptive semiconductor memory device is used for being inserted into a host for storage. The semiconductor memory device comprises a non-volatile memory and a switch. The switch can be a logical switch or a physical switch that controls the semiconductor memory device to be in compliance with either a first specification version or a second specification version of the semiconductor memory device. The second specification version in comparison with the first specification version is used for higher capacity applications.

Abstract: A non-volatile memory device, and a method for accessing the non-volatile memory device are provided. The non-volatile memory device is connected to a host via a bus. The non-volatile memory device comprises an MCU. By independently processing the particular commands using only the auxiliary circuit, the MCU can cease to operate, thus saving power. By setting the bus into power saving mode when the non-volatile memory device is busy, the host and the non-volatile memory device would not communicate mutually, thus, saving power.

Abstract: A method of wear leveling for a non-volatile memory is disclosed. A non-volatile memory is divided into windows and gaps, with each gap between two adjacent windows. The windows comprise physical blocks mapped to logical addresses, and the gaps comprise physical blocks not mapped to logical addresses. The windows are shifted through the non-volatile memory in which the mapping to the physical blocks in the window to be shifted is changed to the physical blocks in the gap.

Abstract: A nonvolatile storage device buffers multiple write commands and selects one or more therefrom according to a choosing policy to execute in priority, so as to increase the probability of continuously executing write commands corresponding to an identical smallest erasable unit, thereby reducing the frequency of backup, erasing and copyback operations and improving the efficiency of the nonvolatile storage device.

Abstract: A virtual SATA port multiplier and a virtual SATA device are provided for a SATA system. The virtual SATA port multiplier uses a SATA physical layer for data transfer between it and a SATA host, and a non-physical layer for direct data transfer between it and the virtual SATA device. Since the data transfer between the virtual SATA port multiplier and the virtual SATA device is not carried out by way of SATA physical layers, no physical layer circuits are required accordingly, thereby reducing the manufacturing cost, power consumption and hardware size of the SATA system.