26.5 Gb/in/sup 2/ areal-density longitudinal thin film media

A 26.5 Gb/in/sup 2/ areal-density demonstration was made using low-noise, thermally stable media and advanced dual-spin-valve heads. The demonstration was achieved at a linear density of 504 kbpi, a track density of 52.6 ktpi, and a data transfer rate of 230 Mb/s. The media had M/sub r/t of 0.40 memu/cm/sup 2/ and coercivity of 2500 Oe, and were composed of a dual-magnetic-layer structure with a five-element magnetic alloy. It was observed that smaller, uniform and isolated magnetic grains are critical to reducing the media noise and for designing ultra-high areal-density recording media that are thermally stable.