Disk surface waviness and its influence on the flying stability at sub-10-nm flying height

With the areal density exceeding 100 Gbit/in/sup 2/, disk drive flying height must be further reduced to sub-10-nm. The study of the flying height stability and slider disk interaction under such a regime is indeed a challenge. This paper reports the effect of the disk surface waviness on the flying stability of a sub10-nm flying slider for three different disks. The surface waviness of the disks was predetermined and specially selected to reflect its influence on the flying height stability. The flying height was measured using the in-situ measurement method where it provided an on-track real-time measurement of the sub-10-nm slider's flying height. The result shows the measurement capability of the in-situ method for the slider-disk interaction and FHM under different disk surface waviness.