Patent ID: 6898045

Claim:
A media including a pair of opposed edges, the media is transported across a tape head in a transport direction during a manufacturing of the media and the tape head including a plurality of alignment elements and a plurality of write elements, the media further comprising: a plurality of alignment transitions that are prerecorded on the media by the alignment elements during the manufacturing of the media and prior to a writing of a data on the media, the alignment transitions including a recorded orientation with respect to a selected one of the opposed edges or the transport direction, and the alignment transitions define a plurality of alignment bands that are spaced apart from each another; and a plurality of written transitions that are prerecorded on the media by the write elements during the manufacturing of the media and prior to the writing of the data on the media, the written transitions define a plurality of write bands that are spaced apart from each other, and wherein the alignment transitions are operative to allow the write elements on the tape head to be precisely aligned with a preferred orientation with respect to the transport direction.