HGST Assigned Three Patents

Temperature sensor
in thermally assisted magnetic recording head
HGST Netherlands, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, has been assigned a patent (8,451,696) developed by five co-inventors for a "temperature sensor in a thermally assisted magnetic recording head."

The co-inventors are Fu-Ying Huang, San Jose, CA, Lidu Huang, Danville, CA, Chie Ching Poon, San Jose, CA, Xinjiang Shen, Fremont, CA, and Barry Cushing Stipe, San Jose, CA

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: "A method and apparatus for providing a signal for driving a heating element in a TAR or HAMR enabled disk storage system that includes an optical transducer (or near-field optical source) for further focusing the beamspot of a laser onto a magnetic media, thereby heating the media. The storage system includes a temperature sensor proximate to the near-field transducer which provides a feedback loop to the laser driver to adjust the power of the laser."

The patent application was filed on Oct. 31, 2011 (13/285,769).

Lubricant with non-terminal functional groups
HGST Netherlands, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, has been assigned a patent (8,481,468) developed by four co-inventors for a "lubricant with non-terminal functional groups."

The co-inventors are Xing-Cai Guo, Tracy, CA, Bruno Marchon, Palo Alto, CA, Robert Waltman, Gilroy, CA, and Run-Han Wang, San Jose, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: "Lubricant with non-terminal functional groups. The location of the functional groups minimizes free chain length and molecular weight of a lubricant while simultaneously maximizing evaporation temperature. The locations of the functional groups to the backbone of the molecule of the lubricant allows for shorter lengths of free backbone length between functional groups attached to a lubricated surface. The lubricant lubricates mechanical devices including HDD drives. The lubricant can also be added to media or other mechanical parts in conjunction with other lubricants."

The patent application was filed on Dec. 21, 2007 (12/004,728).

Power saving optimization for HDDs with external cache
HGST Netherlands, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, has been assigned a patent (8,495,276) developed by Chungi Han, San Jose, CA, and Donald J. Molaro, Cupertino, CA, for a "power saving optimization for disk drives with external cache."

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: "A power conservation system implementable in a computer system. The system includes a non-volatile cache memory (NVCM) device for storing information. The NVCM device is operationally coupled to the computer system. The system also includes a storage device coupled to the NVCM device. The storage device is for storing said information. The system further includes a controller coupled to the NVCM device. The controller initiates an occurrence of writing the information in the NVCM device to the storage device. The occurrence of writing causes powering up of the storage device to which the data is to be written or from which data is to be retrieved."

The patent application was filed on Oct. 12, 2007 (11/974,275).