Flash memory device having memory partitions and including an embedded general purpose operating system for booting a computing device

摘要

Methods and apparatus involve booting a computing device from a flash device. The flash device has memory partitions, including a read-only and a read/write partition. The read-only includes an operating system for use by the computing device and defines an initial system state. The read/write is configured to store a delta from the initial system state. Upon booting the computing device subsequent to an initial boot, the delta and the initial system state together define the whole system state. In other features, a write engine from the read-only partition tracks changes to the initial system state and writes some, but not all of the changes back to the read/write partition thereby minimizing a number of writes to the flash memory. In this manner, the speed of the flash memory can be used to quickly boot/reboot a computing device, while avoiding the wear limits associated with writing to flash devices.