Seagate Technology Incorporated

Storage Technology Corporation

Sperry Rand Corporation

Miniscribe Corporation

Sperry Corporation

James Joseph Touchton

Mark Anthony Gubbins

Robert William Lamberton

Robert Edward Weinstein

Frank J Sordello

John P Hill

Timothy Richard Feldman

Jonathan Williams Haines

Andrew M Rose

Bernardo Rub

Bruce D Emo

Keith W Malang

Edwin Scott Olds

Abhay Tejmal Kataria

John P Squires

Prafulla Bollampalli Reddy

Michael Edward Baum

Peter Igorevich Vasiliev

Hui Su

John Cuda

Haejung Lee

Todd David Baumann

David P Haldeman

FongKheon Chong

John Jay Freeman

Dan Joseph Coonen

Siu Kee Lee

Aigang Feng

Edward R Darrah

Richard J Pederson

David C Robbins

MyintNgwe Maung

Charles Sander

Alan D Kronisch

SienHuay Chong

Taesik Kang

Mary Elizabeth Dunn

Paul M Popoff

The presently disclosed technology teaches integrating disc drive electronics into a transducer head. Decreased electrical transit times and data processing times can be achieved by placing the electronics on or within the transducer head because electrical connections may be made physically shorter than in conventional systems. The electronics may include one or more of a control system circuit, a write driver, and/or a data buffer. The control system circuit generates a modified clock signal that has a fixed relation to phase and frequency of a bit-detected reference signal that corresponds to positions of patterned bits on the disc. The write driver writes outgoing data bits received from an external connection to off-head electronics directly to the writer synchronized with the modified clock signal. The data buffer stores and converts digital data bits sent from the off-head electronics to an analog signal that is synchronized with the modified clock signal.

On head microelectronics for write synchronization

An adaptive guard band for a ramp load/unload device is disclosed to provide extended data storage. In illustrated embodiments, an adaptive guard band algorithm is configured to format one or more discs or media having a lower capacity device with the adaptive guard band and extended data zone utilizing capacity measurements. The algorithm formats the media to provide a track zero at a first cylinder if the capacity is at or above the threshold capacity and a second cylinder if the capacity is below the threshold capacity to provide the extended data storage zone. A size or width of the extended data zone is variable to provide additional capacity to meet the threshold capacity.

Adaptive guard band for improved data storage capacity

A method or system comprising iteratively updating a value of an operating parameter of a storage region of a storage device based on dynamic characterization of the storage region during operation of the storage device and using the updated value of the operating parameter during access to the storage region.

Dynamic tracking of storage region operating parameters

Values are grouped into a first set of groupings of values. Based on inner codes, the number of groupings in the first set of groupings that have at least one erroneous value is determined. If the number of groupings in the first set of groupings that have an erroneous value is fewer than a maximum number of groupings that can be corrected by outer codes, a seek operation is begun. During the seek operation, the outer codes are used to detect and correct the erroneous values that were produced during the reading of values. In other aspects, a parity section for a data section of a data storage device is dirtied before writing any data to the data section such that if writing to the data section is interrupted, the parity section will indicate that it should not be used to correct data read from the data section.

Outer code error correction

A predictive failure control circuit and associated method are provided in a data storing and retrieving apparatus. The circuit is configured to schedule a data integrity operation on data associated with a subportion of a data storage space, in relation to a comparison of an accumulated plurality of executed host access commands associated with the subportion. The subportion can comprise a sector or a single track or a band of tracks. A table preferably stores accumulated number of host access commands for each of a plurality of subportions of the data storage space. The data integrity operation can comprise reading the data on to detect degradation and restoring the recovered data to the same or to new, different tracks. The data subportions can also be reallocated to a new location.

Preventive recovery from adjacent track interference

The track follow gain control of an actuator controller is calibrated by injecting a sinusoidal signal into the position error signal during a servo burst interrupt. The injected signal is bandpass filtered to optimize the coherence of the measurement. A sine error signal is derived based on the filtered (sine actual) signal and a sine desired signal. The sine error signal is applied to the track follow gain control to adjust the amplitude of the control signal to the actuator based on the sine error signal. The sine error is derived by averaging the peaks of the filtered injected signal and subtracting the averaged signal from the desired signal which represents the expected error of the sinusoidal signal under ideal conditions. The recording surfaces may be segmented into a plurality of radial zones in which case a central track is identified in one zone on a selected disc surface. The sine error signal is derived for that zone, after which the process is repeated for the corresponding zone of each other recording surface. The sine error signals derived from the several disc surfaces are averaged to adjust the track follow gain control for the common zone of all disc surfaces.

Adaptive calibration of read/write elements in a disc drive

An apparatus for detecting an over-velocity error condition of a head actuator driven by a voice coil motor in a hard disk drive system includes an integrator for providing an integrated value of the current flowing through the voice coil motor and a detector for detecting when the integrated value exceeds a threshold value. In response to this detection, the supply of current through the voice coil motor is interrupted. To prevent false detections, the integrator is inhibited until the motor current reaches a level indicative of a track access operation.

Method and apparatus for preventing an over-velocity error condition of

An n-phase DC motor is controlled by converting a motor speed command signal generated from a programmed CPU to a motor drive signal and using this motor drive signal to apply DC power to a selected phase of the motor, the amount of applied DC power being a function of the value of the motor speed command signal. Signals representing the position and/or speed of the motor are supplied to the CPU from which the CPU detects speed errors. The speed command signal then is modified to speed up or slow down the motor so as to reduce the detected errors.

Method and apparatus for controlling a motor

A low offset position demodulator that may be used in the positioning servo of a disk drive or similar device. A first stage of the demodulator circuit multiplies or switches a servo carrier signal, modulated with position information, with a synchronized gate signal. This first stage of the demodulator circuit includes a differential output and means for controlling the common mode operating point thereof with an external control voltage. A low pass filter, also having a differential output, is coupled to the differential output of the first stage of the demodulator. A differential-to-single-ended conversion stage is tied to the low pass filter output to provide a single position output signal. Also coupled to the low pass filter differential output is an averaging network that averages the signal appearing on one of the two differential signal lines with the signal appearing on the other differential signal line. The resulting averaged signal is compared to a zero voltage reference signal and the difference between these two signals is then used to derive the control voltage applied to the first stage of the modulator. Hence, the common mode operating point of the balanced demodulator is forced to assume and maintain a zero volt level.

Low offset position demodular

A constant bandwidth automatic gain control (AGC) system is presented. The system is especially suitable for use in the positioning servo system of a magnetic disk storage system. The system includes a double balanced modulator circuit and a fixed gain video amplifier circuit. The double balanced modulator circuit functions as a variable gain element, and the gain thereof is set by a control voltage derived from an otherwise conventional AGC loop. The gain of the current steering stage of the double balanced modulator is limited to values no greater than 0.5.

Constant bandwidth automatic gain control system

An automatic velocity calibrator for a head positioning servo system in a magnetic disk drive performs a velocity calibration in a single pass over the magnetic disks by measuring actuator velocity and adjusting the gain of the velocity transducer in a series of successive approximations. Velocity is determined by turning a timer on in response to a track crossing and turning the timer off after at least two successive track crossings have been detected. A plurality of velocity measurements are stored and averaged. The average velocity is compared to a constant velocity command and an 8-bit latch is incremented or decremented in response to this comparison. A digital to analog converter produces a reference for an automatic gain control amplifier in the servo system which in turn adjusts the velocity transducer gain.

Automatic velocity calibrator for a velocity servo loop in a magnetic

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Boulder, CO, United States of America

James Joseph Touchton