Page "Flash memory" Paragraph 6

Intel Corporation saw the massive potential of the invention and introduced the first commercial NOR type flash chip in 1988.

NOR-based flash has long erase and write times, but provides full address and data buses, allowing random access to any memory location.

This makes it a suitable replacement for older read-only memory ( ROM ) chips, which are used to store program code that rarely needs to be updated, such as a computer's BIOS or the firmware of set-top boxes.

Its endurance may be from as little as 100 erase cycles for an on-chip flash memory, to a more typical 10, 000 or 100, 000 erase cycles, up to 1, 000, 000 erase cycles.

NOR-based flash was the basis of early flash-based removable media ; CompactFlash was originally based on it, though later cards moved to less expensive NAND flash.