Patent Document ID: 9632929
Application ID: 11672924
Patent Status: 1

Claim One:
1. An apparatus comprising: an interface circuit electrically connected to a first number of physical dynamic random access memory (“DRAM”) devices via multiple data paths including a first data path and a distinct second data path, wherein each of the physical DRAM devices is an individual and independent monolithic device, the interface circuit configured to: communicate with the first number of physical DRAM devices and a memory controller, interface the first number of physical DRAM devices to simulate a different, second number of virtual DRAM devices, such that the first number of physical DRAM devices appear to the memory controller as the second number of virtual DRAM devices, each of the virtual DRAM devices being simulated as an individual and independent monolithic device, simulate a first virtual DRAM device using a first physical DRAM device on the first data path and a second physical DRAM device on the distinct second data path, use both a physical row of the first physical DRAM device and a physical row of the second physical DRAM device to simulate a virtual row of the first virtual DRAM device, receive a row-access command from the memory controller, directed to the first virtual DRAM device, for the virtual row of the first virtual DRAM device, receive a column-access command from the memory controller, directed to the first virtual DRAM device, for a particular column of the virtual row, wherein the column-access command from the memory controller is received before the row-access command is used to activate any physical DRAM device, based on the received column-access command, translate the row-access command for the virtual row to a row-access command for either the physical row of the first physical DRAM device or the physical row of the second physical DRAM device that corresponds to part of the virtual row, and activate either the physical row of the first physical DRAM device or the physical row of the second physical DRAM device based on the translated row-access command to activate only part of the virtual row.