Patent ID: 7436621

Claim:
In a tape drive system, an apparatus comprising: a read/write head including first and second bumps wherein the first bump includes at least one first bump read/write element, a first servo read element and a second servo read element, and wherein the second bump includes at least one second bump read/write element, a third servo read element and a fourth servo read element; wherein during a write operation the first bump is a write bump and the second bump is a read bump; wherein the first servo read element is substantially aligned with the third servo read element relative to a tape path; wherein the second servo read element is substantially aligned with the fourth servo read element relative to the tape path; a controller circuit comprising an azimuth processing section connected to receive servo signals provided by the first, second, third and fourth servo read elements during the write operation, the azimuth processing section comprising a multiplexer operative to select servo signals from either the first and third servo read elements or the second and fourth servo read elements for output; a low pass filter operatively connected to the multiplexer, the low pass filter operative to filter the difference between the servo signals output by the multiplexer; and wherein the controller circuit utilizes difference signals output from the low-pass filter to provide an azimuth component of a position error signal during the write operation.