Patent ID: 6198607
Filing Date: 2001-03-06
Classification: G11B

Abstract:
A head for a rigid disk drive comprising:a body having a series of adjoining solid layers bounded by disk-facing and non-disk-facing major surfaces, with a plurality of said layers being oriented substantially parallel to said surfaces and wherein said disk-facing surface has a plurality of microscopic projections, said layers forming a magnetic circuit and an electrical circuit, said magnetic circuit having a pair of poletips exposed on a substantially flat end of one of said projections and separated by a submicron nonmagnetic gap, wherein said electrical circuit shares a magnetoresistive element with said magnetic circuit at a part of said magnetic circuit adjacent to said non-disk-facing surface, and said magnetic circuit includes a plurality of magnetically permeable layers separated by a nonmagnetic layer having a thickness less than that of said magnetically permeable layers and oriented generally parallel to said magnetically permeable layers, wherein said magnetoresistive element is generally aligned with said nonmagnetic layer.