Read and write processes, and head technology for perpendicular recording

In this paper, we present a review of the write and read processes in perpendicular magnetic recording. We also discuss their impact, based on recording physics aspects, on design considerations for writers and readers. For the write process, we discuss fundamental write-ability limitations as well as possible paths to ultra-high areal density perpendicular recording. The impacts of different medium designs, geometrical scaling, and the breakdown of scaling, both in terms of write-ability and transition curvature, are shown based on different modeling techniques, including analytical formulas, finite element modeling (FEM), and micromagnetic simulations. Basic design rules as well as alternative designs that enable high areal density are briefly explained. For the read-back process, the relation between reader signal to noise ratio (SNR) and resistance, as well as reader resistance shunt and spacing loss, are discussed. Finally, we use a simple example to illustrate, both from a write as well as a read-back perspective, the complicated nature of perpendicular recording systems, and how different medium designs impact recording head technology for ultra high density perpendicular recording.     

Adjacent-track interference in ultrahigh-density perpendicular recording system

In perpendicular recording system, the increase of track density is crucial to achieve ultrahigh areal density. At higher track densities, the adjacent-track interference (ATI) arises. In this work, ATI is studied by micromagnetic simulation. Two adjacent tracks are written successively. The track–track distance (TTD) and head–medium spacing are varied to analyze the write and read performance of these two tracks and to investigate the influence of ATI on recording performance. Simulation results indicate that when a track is written first, it is less vulnerable to ATI. ATI is stronger in a track with higher linear recording density. The head–medium spacing plays a significant role in the achievement of low ATI in perpendicular recording system. If the head–medium spacing is reduced to 5 nm, areal recording density above 540 Gb/in² could be realized.     

The limits to magnetic recording — media considerations

At present longitudinal magnetic recording systems are the basis of all low cost high-density information storage systems. During the recent past the data density stored on rigid disk media which is the higher density format have increased at the rate of 60% per annum compound. However, very recently due to the introduction of new advanced GMR spin-valve heads this rate of advance has increased to 100% per annum in laboratory demonstrations. Hence, it is pertinent at this time to enquire as to where the fundamental physical limitations of longitudinal magnetic recording may lie. In this context there are two principle areas of interest: the first of these is limitations to data rate. These are concerned with the fundamental physics of the maximum rate at which a magnetic moment may reverse from one direction to the other. The theoretical calculation of these limits is complex and not well understood but the limits of our understanding will be reviewed in this paper. Secondly, and of principle concern is the limit to the density at which information can be stored in a magnetic thin film. This latter limitation is based around the signal to noise ratio and also the question of the stability of increasingly small written bits. Signal to noise considerations are extremely complex and derive from factors such as the shape of bits and cross-talk between neighbouring bits or even neighbouring tracks. In this article the fundamental origins of noise will be reviewed in terms of the basic physics that gives rise to variation in transition shapes. Cross-talk and cross-track interference will not be discussed as these are generally addressed through issues associated with the resolution of the servo-mechanism that positions the head above a track and is not associated with the fundamental physics of the medium itself. Thermal stability of a bit of information is of critical importance particularly as media is made ever thinner and will form a major aspect of the discussion in this work. Finally, possible material physics solutions to some of these limitations will be presented in terms of measurable parameters which to some limited degree may be controlled by process conditions.     

Magnetic evaluation of advanced metal-evaporated tape in an advanced linear tape drive

Demand for increased data storage has resulted in the development of various types of magnetic tapes. To achieve higher recording density, tape manufacturers are developing thin-film tapes, such as advanced metal-evaporated (AME) tape, for use in linear tape drives. In recent studies, these new AME tapes have demonstrated sustainable mechanical durability at low tensions suitable for use in linear tape drives. An evaluation of the magnetic performance of these AME tapes including the impact of tape cupping and initial edge quality was the goal of this study. Head output, dropouts, head–tape interface friction, and lateral tape motion (LTM) were monitored throughout testing. As track widths continue to narrow, LTM has become one of the critical limitations of magnetic performance. To more accurately measure LTM during drive development, a new method involving the output voltage of a head-read element that has been adjusted to be halfway off the recorded track on tape was implemented (LTM_M). It is shown that positively cupped AME tapes will result in similar head output and fewer dropouts than the current MP tapes. The negatively cupped AME sample produced the lowest head output data and the highest amount of dropouts of all the tapes evaluated in this investigation. All the tapes evaluated demonstrated similar values of LTM when monitored at the center of the tape. When LTM was monitored at the lower edge of the tape, the positively cupped AME tape with the worst relative edge contour length resulted in the highest LTM_M. As found in previous studies, AME tapes produced slightly lower values of coefficient of friction than the MP tapes. From this investigation, positively cupped AME tapes with good initial relative edge contour length are recommended for use in linear tape drives, similar to those used in this study.     

Density limits imposed by the microstructure of magnetic recording media

The fundamental limit of magnetic recording density on conventional media is set by the grain size. Once this grain size limit is reached, only a reduction of the grain size allows an increased SNR and thus an increased areal density. It is shown that, whilst maintaining thermal stability, scaling demands that the required anisotropy energy density K is proportional to the areal density, or the square of the areal density if the medium thickness reaches the critical thickness (A is the exchange stiffness of the material). Recording onto materials with such a high anisotropy requires some form of a write-assist. It is furthermore shown that the grain size limit cannot be obtained with intergranular exchange present, and six different requirements are listed that constitute ideal media. An alternative path for increasing areal density of magnetic recording is to use patterned media, where each bit contains only one grain. In this case, written-in errors dominate system performance and the maximum achievable areal density is estimated to be about 6 Tbit/in². Patterned media need to exhibit narrow distributions of their physical and structural properties with standard deviations of the order of 5% or less.     

Extensions of perpendicular recording

Gains in storage density in magnetic recording have fundamentally been achieved by scaling—reduced geometrical dimensions under the assumption that the recording physics does not change if all dimensions are scaled appropriately. It is becoming clear that evidence of the breakdown of scaling is now seen. We will here discuss ways to break the constraints on magnetic recording set by scaling. In particular, we will discuss energy-assisted recording, domain-wall-assisted recording, and bit-patterned media, with some emphasis on recording system considerations.     

Frictional vibration transmission from a laterally moving surface to a traveling beam

As the density of information stored in automated magnetic tape libraries continues to increase, greater requirements are placed on the precision of mechanical positioning in order to successfully read and write data bits. The location of the read/write head in the direction across the tape's width (termed the lateral direction) is actively controlled in order to maintain alignment between the head and data tracks, even in the presence of the tape's lateral vibration. However, during repositioning, vibration is undesirably transmitted from the laterally moving head structure to the axially moving tape because of frictional contact between the two adjacent surfaces. As an analog of that interaction, a model is developed here to describe frictional vibration transmission from a surface having prescribed lateral motion to a tensioned beam that travels and slides over it. For a transport speed that is high when compared to the lateral vibration velocity, Coulomb friction between the surface and the beam can be well-approximated by an equivalent form of viscous damping. The beam is divided into contiguous regions corresponding to free spans and the beam's portion that contacts the surface. A critical engagement length between the beam and the surface exists for which vibration transmission at a particular natural frequency can be substantially reduced, and for a given mode, that length depends weakly on the surface's position along the beam's span. By contouring the surface to have portions of differing radii of curvature, the extent of vibration transmission can be reduced over a broad range of frequency.     

Drive-based recording analyses at >800 Gfc/in using shingled recording

Since the introduction of perpendicular recording, conventional perpendicular scaling has enabled the hard disk drive industry to deliver products ranging from ∼130 to well over 500 Gb/in² in a little over 4 years. The incredible areal density growth spurt enabled by perpendicular recording is now endangered by an inability to effectively balance writeability with erasure effects at the system level. Shingled magnetic recording (SMR) offers an effective means to continue perpendicular areal density growth using conventional heads and tuned media designs. The use of specially designed edge-write head structures (also known as ‘corner writers’) should further increase the AD gain potential for shingled recording. In this paper, we will demonstrate the drive-based recording performance characteristics of a shingled recording system at areal densities in excess of 800 Gb/in² using a conventional head.Using a production drive base, developmental heads/media and a number of sophisticated analytical routines, we have studied the recording performance of a shingled magnetic recording subsystem. Our observations confirm excellent writeability in excess of 400 ktpi and a perpendicular system with acceptable noise balance, especially at extreme ID and OD skews where the benefits of SMR are quite pronounced. We believe that this demonstration illustrates that SMR is not only capable of productization, but is likely the path of least resistance toward production drive areal density closer to 1 Tb/in² and beyond.     

闪光照相散射定量技术初步研究北大核心CSCD

高能MeV闪光照相所针对的客体通常具有极高的面密度。当X射线穿过客体时,直穿X射线的强度将被极大衰减,到达成像面的直穿信号可能被散射“噪声”所淹没,若直接对图像进行反演将严重影响照相重建精度。从散射抑制角度出发,目前主要采用网柵相机即阵列型准直孔阻挡散射,但网栅相机的应用效果受光源位置稳定性影响较大,且网栅不易加工。提出了一种可实时定量散射强度的照相方案,该方案利用狭缝准直器对散射的抑制能力不随散射强度变化而改变这一特点,对现有照相布局进行小改进,利用已知客体实验结果标定狭缝准直器对散射的抑制能力,进一步自洽确定待测客体的散射量大小。基于蒙卡方法的仿真照相实验结果表明,当采用低面密度客体标定散射抑制系数时,高面密度客体散射强度的估计值与模拟真实值偏差可小于2%。     

Perpendicular magnetic recording—Its development and realization—

The principle of conventional magnetic recording is that magnetic fields are applied parallel to the plane of the magnetic medium. As described in this paper, the invention and development of a new method of placing the magnetized information perpendicular to the plane of the magnetic recording medium is presented. The yield in the mass production of high-density hard disk drives (HDDs) for perpendicular recording is much higher than that of HDDs for conventional recording. Consequently, it is estimated that as many as 75% of the 500 million HDDs to be shipped this year will use this technology.     

Perpendicular magnetic recording technology at 230 Gbit/in

A perpendicular recording system that allows areal densities beyond 200 Gbit/in² has been designed and tested to investigate the major challenges in perpendicular magnetic recording. The integrated write/read head has a trailing shield to improve the write head field gradient and a conventional CIP–GMR reader. The medium is a low-noise CoPtCr-based oxide medium with a CoTaZr soft underlayer. On track byte error rates at ∼ 50 Mb/s are better than 10⁻⁴ at ∼1000 kbpi. Using a 15% off-track criterion at 10⁻² byte error rate, track densities between 200–240 ktpi are realized, yielding areal densities of 210–233 Gbit/in². High-resolution magnetic force microscopy (hrMFM) has been employed to investigate the write characteristics of these heads with improved cross-track resolution. Using a quantitative analysis method, many parameters, such as transition curvature and transition width, are estimated from the hrMFM image. Significant transition curvature is found, which increases the width of the read head response to a transition, T₅₀, by 2–3 nm.These results give insights into the recording physics of perpendicular recording and in particular point out improvements required for achieving even higher areal densities.     

Investigation of Near-Field Imaging Characteristics of Radial Polarization for Application to Optical Data Storage

Radially polarized incident light can generate a more confined longitudinal electric field on a focal plane in near-field (NF) optics than focusing circularly polarized light. Using this phenomenon, it is feasible to reduce beam spot size on storage media to increase the areal density of optical data storage. A radially polarized beam generates a beam spot which is 20% more confined on the 1st surface of medium than that of circularly polarized light. However, the peak intensity of total electric field sharply decreases and its transverse component is much more dominant inside the media stack. This confirms that radially polarized optics can be a candidate not for an NF recording system but for an NF read-only memory (ROM) system. Potentially, the results could be useful to understand the effect of radial and circular polarizations inside and outside medium for various applications of NF optics.     

Triboelectrification of materials used in tape heads

Triboelectrification of tapes by read/write heads can result in either increased error rates or permanent damage to the heads through electrostatic discharge (ESD) or electrochemical processes. In order to understand these phenomena, we have studied triboelectrification between tapes and different tape head materials used in magnetic tape storage drives. The triboelectrification phenomenon can be modeled as a Thevenin equivalent battery or current source whose magnitude is highly dependent not only on materials, but also on physical parameters such as tape speed, wrap angle, the direction of tape over asymmetric multi-material substrates, and the complete electrical circuit. In this report, we will discuss the different physical parameters that affect the tribocharging of tape by different tape and head materials. We also show that tribocharging can cause ESD damage.     

Looking back at perpendicular magnetic recording R&D in NEC

This paper reports perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) circumstances and the results based on the reference published by NEC. The PMR flexible disks using Co-Cr-Ta films were investigated. Pass wear durability of Co-Cr-Ta film strongly depends on the base film surface roughness and Young's modulus values of Co-Cr-Ta films. Pass wear durability, more than 10 million passes, was confirmed under a high temperature (60 °C) and a high humidity (80% RH) condition, as well as a low temperature (5 °C) condition. The read/write characteristics for double-layered PMR media were examined by using a combination of a single-pole-type (SPT) write head and a magnetoresistive (MR) read head, and a conventional merged ring type inductive (ID) write head/MR read head. By differential equalization of the reproduced voltage, the bit error rate less than 10⁻⁶ at 3 Gb/in.² was obtained for the SPT/MR head combination. The antenna effect for PMR realization was analyzed using the merged ring type ID/MR head. In order to increase the magnetic circuit resistance from the ID head pole to the soft underlayer, we developed the sendust (FeAlSi) soft underlayer with low magnetic permeability. We confirmed that the recorded signal has better stability under the ID/MR head-loaded condition than the SPT head-loaded condition. These results show that there are the head and media solutions to realize PMR. We had confidence that we could use the basic structure of the commercial ID/MR head for the PMR head.     

Storage of binary electrical signals in one-dimensional holograms with extremely narrow tracks

A report is given on the results of an experiment in which binary data stored in sequentially superimposed one-dimensional holograms with extremely narrow tracks were recorded on a transported recording medium. The width of the holograms was reduced to 3 μm. Since the results obtained show the optical signal-to-noise ratio of the reconstructed image points to be only slightly inferior to that with holograms with 100 μm wide tracks, the method used can be expected to yield an areal bit density greater than 10⁷ bits/cm².     

Effect of discrete track medium at high areal density

The degradation of SNR caused by the higher uniaxial crystalline anisotropy field (Hk) of medium and small write fields of narrower write width is one of the problems for achieving higher areal density. The SNR dependence on Hk of a medium with different write fields of head using the discrete track medium (DTM) is investigated by using micromagnetics simulation. As a result, the curves of SNR as a function of Hk have peak values. In DTM, the peak values of SNR are almost constant at any Hk of the medium and different write fields. Higher SNR is realized even at low Hk and small write field in DTM.     

Observations of fission-tracks in zircons by atomic force microscope

The fission-track (FT) method is a dating technique based on the observation of damage (tracks) by spontaneous fission of ²³⁸U left in a mineral. The date is calculated from the track density and the uranium concentration in the mineral. This is possible because the number of tracks is a function of uranium concentration and time since the start of track accumulation. Usually, the number of tracks is counted under an optical microscope after etching (chemical expansion of a track). However, as FT density per unit area rises, it becomes difficult to count the number of tracks. This is due to the fact that FTs overlap one another and are unable to be readily distinguished. This research examines the potential of atomic force microscope (AFM) for FT dating using zircons, which are likely to show higher FT density than other minerals due to their high U concentrations.To obtain an AFM image for a sample prepared for FT dating, removing the static electricity of the sample is essential to avoid an unexpected movement of the cantilever. A grain should be wider than about 30 μm to bring the cantilever on the mineral surface. Polishing with a fine grained compound is very important. There is not much difference in sharpness between images by AC mode (scanning with vibrating cantilever at a constant cycle) and Contact mode (scanning with the cantilever always in close contact with the surface). To confirm how tracks can be identified with the AFM, an AFM image was compared with an image obtained with the optical microscope. When change in the number of tracks and their shapes were observed through stepwise etching, the track expanded as the etching time increased. In addition, the etching rate was slower for large tracks than those for small tracks. This implied that the AFM can be used to observe etching of zircons with different degrees of nuclear fission damage. A track that could not be seen with the optical microscope due to insufficient etching could be observed by AFM methods, indicating the possibility of FT dating with high track densities using AFM after relatively short etching periods.     

Characteristics of reverse overwrite process in shingled recording scheme at ultra-high track density

A systematic experimental study of the reverse overwrite (ReOVW) process in the shingled recording scheme has been conducted in conjunction with characterization of corresponding recording performances from recording heads with different geometries. It was found that there is no ReOVW reduction as the track density increases in a strict shingled recording fashion. Nonetheless, ReOVW is indeed slightly decreased from 300 to 700 kpi in a so-called one write shingled recording process. Overall our obtained data suggest that conventional magnetic recording technology might be able to extend all the way beyond an areal density of one Tbit/in² by using the shingled recording scheme.     

A new method for measuring tracks density in CR-39 detectors by compensating for overlapping tracks

CR-39 nuclear track detectors have been used as an efficient radon monitoring system. Exposing these detectors to radon would result in tracks where ever particles hit the surface of the detector. Natural radioactivity of alpha particles (radon concentration) is measured based on the count of these tracks on CR-39 detector. Counting these tracks by eye is not an easy task especially when the density of the tracks is high. Automated tracks counting systems are attractive solution for this problem. However, as the density of tracks increases the accuracy of these methods deteriorates. This is due to the fact that overlapped tracks are counted as one track during the segmentation process resulting in an underestimation of the real count of the tracks. This work proposes a new image processing based automated approach for tracks counting. This new automated approach solves the problem of counting overlapping tracks by approximating their number and then adjusting the final count of tracks by compensating for those uncounted tracks. The experimental results show that the proposed approach reduces the counting percentage error from 5.64% to 2.54% by solving the counting problem of the overlapped tracks.     

变宽度分割电极片状压电致动器的位移特性

针对硬磁盘驱动器中磁头定位两级伺服系统设计了一种新型压电致动器——悬臂梁式变宽度分割电极片状压电致动器.沿厚度方向极化的PZT压电陶瓷薄长片，宽度沿长度方向变化且沿长轴对称，一端固定一端自由构成悬臂梁.其上下两表面的电极均沿长轴分割成对称的两部分.施加电场使其中一半在d₃₁模式作用下伸长，而与其对称的另一半缩短，则压电片沿宽度方向产生弯曲，自由端便可产生致动位移.对该致动器的驱动电压-端部致动位移特性进行了理论分析、有限元模拟及实验验证.致动器中的电场诱导应力远小于陶瓷的抗张强度.致动器端部位移的测试结果略大于理论计算值.与现有磁头悬浮臂尺寸相近的致动器，在20—50V的电压驱动下均可获得1—2μm的致动位移.对25kTPI(track per inch)的高道密度硬磁盘，该位移已能覆盖至少一个磁道宽度，满足磁头定位两级伺服系统对第二级致动器致动位移的基本要求. 关键词：