Fabrication and electrical properties of lapped type of TMR heads for /spl sim/50 Gb/in/sup 2/ and beyond

• Published in: IEEE transactions on magnetics Vol. 38; no. 1; pp. 72 - 77
• Main Authors: Araki, S., Sato, K., Kagami, T., Saruki, S., Uesugi, T., Kasahara, N., Kuwashima, T., Ohta, N., Jijun Sun, Nagai, K., Shuxiang Li, Hachisuka, N., Hatate, H., Kagotani, T., Takahashi, N., Ueda, K., Matsuzaki, M.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: IEEE 01.01.2002
• Subjects: Contact resistance; Fabrication; Giant magnetoresistance; Lapping; Magnetic heads; Magnetic materials; Magnetic recording; Preamplifiers; Tunneling magnetoresistance; Voltage
• ISSN: 0018-9464; 1941-0069
• DOI: 10.1109/TMAG.2002.988914

Tunnel giant magnetoresistance (TMR) heads at /spl sim/50 Gb/in/sup 2/ have been fabricated using improved lapping process. Together with writer of 2.0 T pole materials, recording performance has been demonstrated at magnetic write width of 0.28 /spl mu/m and magnetic read width of 0.18 /spl mu/m. The resistance area product of final wafer data is around 5 /spl Omega//spl middot//spl mu/m/sup 2/, with lead and contact resistance included, resulting in a final head resistance of around 200 /spl Omega/. The output voltage achieved for 1 mA bias current is 42 mV//spl mu/m, and the isolated pulses are stable. With a discrete preamplifier, the track density as measured by "747 curve" is 94 kTPI at a bit-error rate of 10/sup -4/ and the linear density is 508 kBPI, achieving an areal density of 48 Gb/in/sup 2/. The noise analysis reveals that the noises come mainly from media and shot noise.