Patent ID: 7378164

Claim:
A magnetic recording medium, comprising: a soft underlayer structure consisting of a first soft underlayer, a first exchange isolation layer, an exchange pinning layer and a second soft underlayer, the first soft underlayer being disposed on a substrate of the magnetic recording medium and having a first magnetization saturation value, the first exchange isolation layer being disposed on the first soft underlayer and decoupling domain walls and other magnetic defects of the first soft underlayer from other layers of the magnetic recording medium, the exchange pinning layer being disposed on the first exchange isolation layer; and providing exchange coupling with an adjacent magnetic layer, the second soft underlayer being disposed on the exchange pinning layer and exchange coupled to the exchange pinning layer, the second soft underlayer having a second magnetization saturation value, the second magnetization saturation value being greater than the first magnetization saturation value; a second exchange isolation layer disposed on the second soft underlayer; and a recording storage layer disposed on the second exchange isolation layer.