Patent ID: 7413845

Claim:
A method of forming a component of a thin film magnetic head, wherein the magnetic head is formed from a structure that includes a substrate layer, a seedlayer deposited on the substrate layer, and a photoresist composition layer deposited on the seedlayer, comprising: providing a high activation energy chemically amplified photoresist composition as said photoresist composition layer; patternwise exposing said photoresist composition layer to an imaging radiation source to form a latent, patterned image in the photoresist composition layer; developing the latent image in the photoresist composition layer with a developer to form a patterned photoresist; and, performing a plating process to form the thin film magnetic head component by directly contacting the patterned photoresist with a plating process solution having a pH of less than about 3.0, wherein the plated thin film magnetic head component is essentially free of plating defects.