Patent ID: 8526133

Claim:
A circuit for calculating a fly height value, the circuit comprising: a first pattern detector circuit operable to identify a first pattern in a received data set, wherein the received data set corresponds to user data disposed between a first servo data region and a second servo data region; a first pattern fly height calculation circuit operable to calculate a first fly height using data values corresponding to the first pattern to yield a first pattern fly height output; a first averaging circuit operable to average the first pattern fly height output with other instances of the first fly height output to yield a first averaged output; a second pattern detector circuit operable to identify a second pattern in the received data set; a second pattern fly height calculation circuit operable to calculate a second fly height using data values corresponding to the second pattern to yield a second pattern fly height output; a second averaging circuit operable to average the second pattern fly height output with other instances of the second pattern fly height output to yield a second averaged output; and a combining circuit operable to combine at least the first averaged output and the second averaged output to yield a composite fly height value.