According to one embodiment, a magnetic disk device includes a disk including a first recording area, a head includes a write head configured to write data to the disk, and a read head configured to read data from the disk, and a controller configured to set particular areas in same circumferential positions on tracks of the first recording area, and to write, to the respective particular areas, parity data based on data read from areas other than the particular areas.

According to one embodiment, servo patterns different in servo pattern frequency are recorded in zones divided in a radial direction on a magnetic disc, and the servo patterns in the adjacent zones overlap each other in a predetermined area from a zone servo boundary between the zones, and a determination boundary where it is determined to execute a crossing process is set within the overlapping area of the servo patterns upstream from the zone servo boundary, based on position information on a seek destination and the present position of the magnetic head.

Method and apparatus for data security in a data storage device. In some embodiments, a first version of firmware is installed in a memory of the device. The firmware is used by a programmable processor to control accesses to a rotatable data recording medium on which is written pre-recorded servo positioning data used to position a data transducer. A newer, second version of the firmwave is subsequently installed in the memory to replace the first version of firmware. The second version of the firmware includes an instruction to corrupt a selected portion of the servo positioning data on the medium in order to authenticate the second version of the firmware. During a subsequent initialization of the device, host access is granted based on detection of the corruption of the selected portion of the servo positioning data.

Apparatus and method for magnetic recording media. A rotatable magnetic recording disc has an outermost annular sidewall that extends at nominally 97 millimeters, mm for a 3 inch form factor data storage device or at nominally 67 mm for a 2 inch form factor data storage device. The rotatable magnetic recording disc further has a disc shaped substrate of metal or glass, and a magnetic recording layer supported by the disc shaped substrate and configured to magnetically record data along concentric tracks.

A magnetic disk device includes a magnetic disk, a magnetic head, a voice coil motor which drives movement of the magnetic head relative to the magnetic disk, a drive circuit which drives the voice coil motor, a memory in which a seek time for a seek operation is stored in association with a seek distance of the magnetic head, and a controller. The controller changes the seek time stored in the memory in association with the seek distance based on a temperature and a power supply voltage of the drive circuit.

In a gimbal dual stage actuated (GSA) suspension for a disk drive, a viscoelastic damper is disposed between and adhered to the suspension's PZT microactuator and the flexure trace gimbal. The damper is dispensed in fluid form onto the trace gimbal during assembly of the suspension, the PZT is placed onto the damper, and the damper is then hardened leaving it adhered to both the PZT and the trace gimbal. The damper reduces peaks in the frequency response of the PZT actuation, thus allowing higher bandwidth of the servo control loop and increasing the effective read and write speeds for the suspension.

A carriage device includes a first guide member and a second guide member for supporting a carriage with a head mounted thereon at two separate positions and guiding reciprocation of the carriage, a first adjustment unit configured to adjust a height of the carriage relative to the first guide member through movement of the carriage, and a second adjustment unit configured to adjust a height of the carriage relative to the second guide member through the movement of the carriage. The carriage device can sequentially perform a first operation of changing the height of the carriage by the first adjustment unit and a second operation of changing the height of the carriage by the second adjustment unit.

A microactuator for a dual stage actuated suspension for a hard disk drive is constructed as a longitudinal stack of piezoelectric (PZT) elements acting in the d33 mode, expanding or contracting longitudinally when an electric field is applied across them in the longitudinal direction. The microactuator has interlaced electrode fingers that separate and define the individual PZT elements, and apply the electric field. A stiff constraint layer having a high Young's modulus is affixed to the microactuator on the side opposite the suspension to which the microactuator is bonded. The constraint layer may be a layer of substantially inactive PZT material that is formed integrally with the PZT elements but without electrodes in the inactive PZT layer. The presence of the stiff constraint layer increases the effective stroke length of the microactuator.

A storage device performs a background operation involving seeking a read/write head between inner and outer diameters of a disk of the storage device. During the seeking, adjacent test tracks are written at a diameter between the inner and outer diameters of the disk. The adjacent test tracks are written using varying levels of laser power applied to the disk via the read/write head. An optimum value of the laser power is determined based on reading at least one of the adjacent test tracks.

Embodiments of disk drive head suspensions are described that include a spring metal layer. The spring metal layer includes a base region, support arms extending from the base region, and a slider mounting region. The slider mounting region includes a proximal portion, a distal portion, and a pair of motor openings. The motor openings are configured to receive motors such that the longitudinal axes of the motors are non-parallel with the longitudinal axis of the slider mounting region. The suspensions include traces that include a base portion on the base region of the spring metal layer, a spring metal-unsupported portion extending from the base region to the slider mounting region, and a slider mounting portion extending from the spring metal-unsupported portion onto the slider mounting region. And, the suspensions include an insulating layer between portions of the spring metal layer and the conductor layer.