Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Netherlands B.v.

Hgst Netherlands, B.v.

Other

Fujitsu General Limited

Nanofilm Technologies International Limited

Shinji Sasaki

Hiroshi Inaba

Nobuto Yasui

Naoki Chinone

Kazuhisa Uomi

Tsukuru Ohtoshi

Kenji Furusawa

Hiroshi Saito

Takuya Matsumoto

Tomonobu Tsuchiya

Kazuhito Miyata

Minoru Yamasaka

Kentaro Namikawa

Atsushi Amatatsu

Shi Xu

Shinya Hirano

Makoto Torigoe

Yasumichi Suzuki

Masayuki Kurita

Shinji Sakano

Takayoshi Ohtsu

Toshiya Shiramatsu

Toru Otsubo

Mitsuaki Horiuchi

Jiro Matsuo

Hideo Yamakura

Kouji Kataoka

Masatomo Terakado

Toshio Seki

Takateru Seki

Mineaki Kodama

Akio Takakura

Hiromu Chiba

Hiroshi Ishizaki

Ichirou Sasaki

Hideki Tateishi

Kazuhiro Ohara

Shigeru Ono

Hidetoshi Anan

Xudong Yang

An air conditioner includes a refrigerant circuit in which indoor units are connected to an outdoor unit. The conditioner includes a processor to detect a state quantity related to control on the air conditioner, acquire a detected value of the detected quantity and estimate occurrence of abnormality of the circuit by using a detected value of a feature value by assuming that the quantity related to abnormality of the circuit is adopted as the feature value. The estimating adopts the outdoor unit and each of the indoor units as a single pair, estimates occurrence of abnormality in the circuit for each of the pairs, estimates that abnormality has occurred in the indoor unit of a subject pair when estimating that abnormality has occurred in any of the pair, and estimates that abnormality has occurred in the outdoor unit when estimating that abnormality has occurred in all of the pairs.

Air conditioning system, abnormality estimation method for air conditioning system, air conditioner, and abnormality estimation method for air conditioner

According to one embodiment, a magnetic head includes a write element, a read element, and a heating element disposed between the write element and the read element. When power is applied to the heating element, either the read element or the write element projects beyond a plane of an air-bearing surface (ABS) of the magnetic head, and when power is not applied to the heating element, a portion of the ABS of the magnetic head facing a magnetic disk close to the heating element has a concave shape. In another embodiment, when power is applied to the heating element, at least one of a portion of the read element and a portion of the write element approaches a magnetic disk, and when power is not applied to the heating element, a portion of the ABS of the magnetic head facing a magnetic disk close to the heating element has a concave shape.

Magnetic head with a heating element between the read and write element and method of manufacturing thereof

In one embodiment, a device includes a near-field light transducer having multiple apexes including a trailing-side apex positioned on a trailing side of the near-field light transducer. The device also includes a first material positioned near the trailing-side apex of the near-field light transducer, and a second material positioned near another apex of the near-field light transducer. The first material is physically characterized as etching more slowly than the second material.

Thermally-assisted magnetic recording head

In one embodiment, a device includes a light source, a near-field light transducer including an electroconductive scattering body configured for generating near-field light when irradiated by light from the light source, the near-field light transducer including a triangular shape at a media-facing surface thereof having three apexes including a trailing-side apex positioned on a trailing side of the near-field light transducer, a main pole configured for writing data to a magnetic medium, the main pole being positioned in a down-track direction from the near-field light transducer, a first material positioned near the trailing-side apex of the near-field light transducer, and a second material positioned near other apexes of the near-field light transducer, the first material being more difficult to etch than the second material, wherein the near-field light transducer is configured to assist the main pole in writing data to the magnetic medium by production of the near-field light.

A magnetic head suitable for high-density recording is provided at a high yield by a method that suppresses a reduction in reproducing output signal due to ion-beam irradiation. After an air-bearing surface of a read element, a magnetic-head element, or a row bar is mechanically polished, the air-bearing surface is irradiated with an ion beam, such that an orthographic projection of an ion-beam incidence direction onto the air-bearing surface forms an in-plane incidence angle of 30 degrees to 150 degrees or of 210 degrees to 330 degrees with respect to a track-width direction. Thereby, the formation of a short circuit due to ion-beam irradiation may be hindered.

Method of manufacturing a magnetic head

Since structural portions of a device made of a plurality of materials are different from one another in mechanical hardness, it is very difficult to uniformly lap the structural portions. This is attributable to generation of machining recessions due to differences in lapped amount when large fixed abrasive grains are used, and generation of lapping marks caused by that the dropped abrasive grains rotate. Accordingly, in order to cope with the disadvantage, it is essential to surely grip abrasive grains of small size to a surface of a surface plate. [Solving Means]Abrasive grains are fixedly forced into a surface of a lapping tool with mechanical pressure and then the surface of the lapping tool including the abrasive grains is subjected to plasma processing, whereby an improvement in adhesion between the abrasive grains and a surface plate and reduction in the number of loose abrasive grains, which are dropped from the surface of the lapping tool, can be achieved, so that it is possible to realize lapping, in which a surface of a device made of a plurality of materials is made very plane.

Lapping tool and method for manufacturing the same

In one embodiment of the present invention, a method of producing a magnetic head slider comprises the steps of forming, on the air bearing surface of the slider, an air bearing surface overcoat, removing the surface region from a hard amorphous carbon film by the irradiation with an ion beam which is tilted with respect to a normal to the air bearing surface, and forming a rail in the air bearing surface on which the air bearing surface overcoat has been formed. A high density and covering performance are obtained when the angle of irradiating the ion beam is not smaller than about 60 degrees from a normal to the air bearing surface of the magnetic head slider and when the acceleration voltage for the ion beam is not higher than about 300 V in the step of removing part of the air bearing surface overcoat.

Method of producing a magnetic head slider

A magnetic head suffers mechanical stresses by striking against a magnetic disc surface and dust, so that there are problems such as the reduction of reproduction output due to the mechanical stresses and the reversal of output polarity due to the mechanical stresses. Embodiments in accordance with the present invention relate to a method of testing reliability of reproduction elements of a magnetic head against outside stress. In a first step, a Giant Magnetoresistive (GMR) element on a row bar of the object of inspection, or a GMR element on a slider is measured for the output against external magnetic field. In the next step, prescribed shearing stress is applied with indenter to the edge where the GMR element-formed surface of the row bar or slider and the air-bearing surface are crossed. Then, output of the GMR element is measured again. Lastly, the outputs of the GMR element before and after application of stress are compared. When the amount of degradation is higher than the prescribed standard, the product is regarded as disqualified. Satisfaction of the prescribed standard is regarded as acceptance.

Testing and manufacturing method of magnetic heads

In a cluster ion beam irradiation apparatus including an apparatus for measuring size and energy distribution of gas cluster ions by using the time of flight (TOF) mass spectrometry, a unit for applying a retarding voltage is disposed in a stage preceding a TOF measuring instrument including a drift tube and a current measuring instrument. By measuring the size and energy distribution of the gas cluster ions and adjusting ionization conditions, cluster ions having predetermined energy and size are supplied to a work surface. In addition, a product of a pressure in an ion transportation device and an ion transportation length is controlled so as to satisfy the relation P&#xd7;L&#x2266;30/N/EPa&#xb7;m, where N is the size of gas cluster ions used for irradiation, and E is kinetic energy (eV) of the gas cluster ions.

Gas cluster-ion irradiation apparatus

Embodiments of the invention provide an air bearing surface protection film having good corrosive resistance, electrical insulative property and mechanical wear resistance in the state of an extremely thin film. In one embodiment, an air bearing surface protection film having good corrosive resistance, electrical insulative property and mechanical wear resistance in a state of an extremely thin film is obtained by disposing a thin silicon nitride film having high density, high electric resistance, chemical stability and high adhesion with a substrate as a lowermost air bearing surface protection film and disposing a film comprising tetrahedral amorphous carbon and nitrogen as an uppermost air bearing surface protection film.

Magnetic head with air bearing surface protection film

A thin film magnetic head includes a three-step configuration including deep and shallow groove surfaces, a super shallow groove surface, and an air bearing surface, and also, island-shaped center rail is provided in the center of the air outflow end of the disk-facing air bearing surface having a boundary on the surface of base alumina between a head element portion and a substrate, without including the surface of the substrate. Further, by providing in the surface of the substrate the super shallow groove surface shallower than a shallow groove surface, an alumina recession between the surface of the substrate and the head element portion, produced in a shallow dual step sub ambient slider, can be eliminated. Magnetic spacing between the head of the head element portion and the magnetic layer of the disk can be thereby reduced.

Thin film magnetic head

A plasma processing device include a plasma generation unit for generating plasma by using a cathodic arc discharge, first and second magnetic field ducts arranged in a row for transporting the plasma with one end of the row being connected to the plasma generation unit and a processing chamber connected to the other end of the row unit and having a stage for holding a substrate to be processed. A shutter is provided for covering the plasma during a period of a predetermined time after start of arc discharge or during a period of predetermined time before end of arc discharge. The shutter is disposed between the first magnetic field duct and the substrate to be processed, and is movable. The shutter is capable of being supplied with a voltage, and is kept in a state so as to be electrically insulated from the processing chamber.

Plasma processing apparatus with real-time particle filter

In the plasma processing device which utilizes a low pressure arc discharge, a method for efficiently capturing and removing electrically charged particles and neutral particles having no charge which are at most 5 &mgr;m in particle diameter is demanded. The electrically charged particles can be captured efficiently by installing an electric field filter in a transportation course of plasma. The electric field filter has a cylindrical structure which is uneven in inner wall shape. A voltage in the range of 10 to 90 V is applied to the electric field filter. The neutral filters can be captured efficiently by installing a neutral filter having an opening sectional area which is at most 40% of a sectional area of the transportation course.

A method of forming a thin film by a bias sputtering method using a first target made of a refractory metal mainly composed of W and a second target made of a conductive material mainly composed of a low-melting-point metal which comprises, upon sputtering the first target made of the refractory metal mainly composed of W, decreasing high energy particles incident to a substrate in a state where a desired bias voltage is applied to a substrate thereby forming a thin film of the refractory metal mainly composed of W with low resistivity and less stress and, subsequently, upon sputtering the second target made of the conductive material mainly composed of the low-melting-point metal, accelerating the growth of crystals in a state where a desired voltage is applied to a substrate thereby forming in lamination a thin film of the conductive material mainly composed of the low-melting-point metal with a large crystal grain size on the thin film made of the refractory metal mainly composed of W.

Thin film forming method

A method of and apparatus removes foreign particles in a vacuum or in a dry atmosphere before and in continuation to performing a dry process, such as a dry etching or a sputtering process. For this purpose, the foreign particles are separated from a substrate by subjecting the foreign particles to a force for separating the foreign particles from the substrate and a vibrating force for vibrating the foreign particles at the same time, and then the frequency of vibration is changed to match the resonant frequency of a vibration system formed by each of the foreign particles and the substrate, thereby applying a vibration energy to the foreign particles due to resonance. The separated foreign particles floating in a plasma are drawn to an electrode having a potential which is controlled such that a flowing-in of electrons is reduced, and the particles are discharged from the inside of the plasma. In this way, the foreign particles can be reduced and the yield of the product in manufacturing semiconductors and TFTs can be promoted. Further, a cleaning step, a film forming operation, an etching process and the like can continuously be processed, thereby achieving a reduction in steps and a promotion in productivity.

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Kanagawa, Japan

Shinji Sasaki