Patent ID: 7701671

Claim:
A head slider of a disk apparatus comprising: a magnetic element adapted to fly over a disk type magnetic recording medium to record or reproduce magnetic information between the magnetic element and the magnetic recording medium; a surface of the head slider opposed to the medium being formed with, with respect to the direction in which the medium runs, an inflow pad portion at the upstream end and a pair of side rail portions extending downstream from the inflow pad portion, and a center pad at the central part and a pair of side pads on the sides of the center pad and upstream of the center pad at the downstream end of the head slider; and each of the inflow pad portion, the center pad and the side pads having an air-bearing surface and a stepped surface, a height thereof being smaller than that of the air bearing surface, at least one of the side rail portions being connected with the corresponding side pad and at least the side rail portion being arranged nearer to a traverse center of the head slider by 10 μm or more from a corresponding side edge of the head slider.