Patent ID: 8057689

Claim:
A method of manufacturing a magnetic recording medium, comprising: forming a first hard mask, a second hard mask selected from the group consisting of Silicon (Si), Silicon carbide (SiC), Silicon oxycarbide (SiOC), Silicon dioxide (SiO 2 ), Silicon nitride (SiN) and Silicon oxynitride (SiON) and having thickness of 2 nm to 10 nm, and a resist on a magnetic recording layer; imprinting a stamper to the resist to transfer patterns of protrusions and recesses to the resist; removing residues in the recesses of the patterned resist with a first etching gas selected from the group consisting of Tetrafluoromethane (CF 4 ), Sulfur hexafluoride (SF 6 ) and Trifluoromethane (CHF 3 ); etching the second hard mask with the first etching gas using the patterned resist as a mask to transfer the patterns of protrusions and recesses to the second hard mask; etching the first hard mask with a second etching gas using the second hard mask as a mask to transfer the patterns of protrusions and recesses to the first hard mask; and ion beam etching to deactivate the magnetic recording layer exposed in the recesses and to remove the second hard mask.