A Restore-Free Mode for MLC STT-RAM Caches

Spin-transfer torque RAM (STT-RAM) caches are foreseen to replace traditional static RAM caches because of their nonvolatile nature and high density. Multilevel cell (MLC) STT-RAMs further enhance the storage density of single-level cell STT-RAMs. However, the two-step read/write process in MLC STT-RAMs adversely affects performance, energy consumption, and lifetime. Moreover, technology scaling makes the read operations disturb the stored data...