Abstract: Embodiments of the present invention help to inhibit record information in a perpendicular magnetic recording disk drive from being attenuated or erased due to leakage of a recording magnetic field into the already-recorded information. According to one embodiment, a magnetic disk includes a soft magnetic underlayer and a magnetic recording layer. A magnetic head includes a main magnetic pole, an auxiliary magnetic pole, a trailing shield which is disposed via a non-magnetic film on a trailing side of the main magnetic pole and in which a reverse side is in contact with the auxiliary magnetic pole, and side shields disposed on both sides of the main magnetic pole.

Abstract: Embodiments of the present invention provide a magnetic head for perpendicular magnetic recording, and a magnetic disk apparatus capable of preventing data erasure caused by alignment marks. In an embodiment, the magnetic head includes a head element including at least a main pole having a pole face on a flying surface and an auxiliary pole; alignment marks made of a magnetic material and used to detect the amount of lapping work when lapping the pole face of the main pole; and members made of a magnetic material, continuously extending in either direction with respect to the position of the main pole from within the alignment marks outward at least beyond the alignment marks.

Abstract: Embodiments of the invention reduce generation of a magnetic field with a polarity reverse to that of the recording magnetic field, without deteriorating a gradient in the magnetic field. An embodiment of a magnetic disk device according to the present invention suppresses deviation and erase of already recorded data. In an embodiment, the perpendicular magnetic recording head includes the main magnetic pole, an auxiliary magnetic pole, a trailing shield disposed on the trailing side of the main magnetic pole with a non-magnetic film placed in-between, and side shields disposed on both the sides of the main magnetic pole in the direction of the track width with a non-magnetic film placed in-between. The trailing shield has on the trailing side a portion where film thickness is thinner on the trailing side than the thickness of its element in the height direction in its position facing the main magnetic pole.

Abstract: In a patterned perpendicular magnetic recording medium, embodiments of the present invention provide a magnetic head in which magnetic field to be applied to adjacent tracks can be suppressed and a recording device equipped with the magnetic head. In one embodiment of the present invention, a sum of a width Pw of a main pole of a magnetic head and distances between right and left magnetic substances on a width-directional side of tracks and the main pole, so-called widths of side gap lengths s_g1—1 and s_g1—2 is, in a magnetic recording medium having a soft-magnetic underlayer, made to be not more than a sum of a width w_land of a convexity or land of the soft-magnetic underlayer and widths w_groove—1 and w_groove—2 of concavities or grooves adjacent to the land on both its sides.

Abstract: Embodiments in accordance with the present invention provide a perpendicular recording magnetic head whose dimensional dependency on the nonuniformity of magnetic field strength and distribution during manufacture is minimized, with narrowed tracks and without attenuation or erasure of adjacent track data while maintaining high magnetic field strength. According to one embodiment, a magnetic material (trailing/side shield) for creating a steep gradient of magnetic field strength is provided at a trailing side of a pole tip of a main magnetic pole piece and in a direction of the track width. The magnetic head is formed so that a gap (side gap length “gl”) between a side shield and a throat height portion of the pole tip progressively decreases with an increasing distance from an air-bearing surface, in a direction of an element height.