WD Assigned Seven Patents

Optimizing garbage collection in storage
Western Digital Technologies, Irvine, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,521,972) developed by William B. Boyle, Lake Forest, CA, and Robert M. Fallone, Newport Beach, CA, for a “system and method for optimizing garbage collection in storage.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “The present invention is directed to systems and methods for optimizing garbage collection in storage. The storage may be a shingled disk drive or a non-volatile solid-state memory device. Garbage collection is optimized by selectively saving data read from certain locations of the storage in response to host read commands and using the saved data for subsequent garbage collection operations. The decision of whether to save data may be based on a number of criteria, including whether the data is located in an area of the storage that is due to be garbage collected in the near future. In this manner, certain garbage collection operations can be performed without having to re-read the saved data.”

The patent application was filed on June 30, 2010 (12/827,931).

Storage device enclosure enabling use
of a common shock mount across different products
Western Digital Technologies, Irvine, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,547,658) developed by Wally Szeremeta, Mission Viejo, CA, for a “storage device enclosure enabling use of a common shock mount across different products.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A storage device assembly comprises a storage device, a shock mount configured to couple to the storage device, and an enclosure comprising first and second portions. The first enclosure portion may comprise a first pocket defining a first nesting surface, and a first plurality of ribs configured to contact a first portion of the shock mount over an aggregate first surface area that is less than a surface area of the first nesting surface. The second enclosure portion may be configured to mate with the first enclosure portion to enclose the storage device therebetween. The second enclosure portion may comprise a second pocket defining a second nesting surface and a second plurality of ribs configured to contact a second portion of the shock mount over an aggregate second surface area that is less than a surface area of the second nesting surface.”

The patent application was filed on Oct. 18, 2012 (13/655,297).

Data recovery in SSD device
Western Digital Technologies, Irvine, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,503,237) developed by Robert L. Horn, Yorba Linda, CA, for a “system and method for data recovery in a solid state storage device.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “Embodiments of solid-state storage system are provided herein include data recovery mechanism to recover data upon detection of a read error (e.g., an uncorrectable ECC error) in a storage element such as a page. In various embodiments, the system is configured to determine optimal reference voltage value(s) by evaluating the reference voltage value(s) of page(s) that are related to the page where the failure occurred. The related page(a) may include a page that is paired with the initial page where the failure occurred (e.g., the paired pages reside in a common memory cell), or a neighboring page that is physically near the page where the initial page, and/or a paired page of the neighboring page. In another embodiment, the system is configured to perform a time-limited search function to attempt to determine optimal reference voltage values through an iterative process that adjusts voltage values in a progression to determine a set of values that can retrieve the data.”

The patent application was filed on May 18, 2011 (13/110,662).

Adaptive throttling of data refresh operations
and disk drives implementing the same
Western Digital Technologies, Irvine, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,531,791) developed by Bruce E. Reid, Irvine, CA, Robert M. Fallone, Newport Beach, CA, and Kaustubh S. Patkar, Agoura Hills, CA, for “methods for adaptive throttling of data refresh operations and disk drives implementing the same.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A method of refreshing data on a HDD drive configured to carry out commands issued by a host that comprises tracking run-time conditions related to patterns of host command activity on the HDD drive; selecting an entry from a high priority pool that is configured to hold a predetermined maximum number of entries, each entry comprising a plurality of tracks having been designated as being eligible for a high priority refresh operation as a result of the host command activity; refreshing data stored on at least one track of the selected entry; pausing the refreshing for a period of time equal to a throttle interval to process at least one command issued by the host before returning to the selecting or to the refreshing, and periodically modifying a value of the throttle interval depending upon the tracked run-time conditions.”

The patent application was filed on Feb. 1, 2012 (13/364,186).

Magnetic recording head with nano scale pole tip bulge
Western Digital, Fremont, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,520,336) developed by five co-inventors for a “magnetic recording head with nano scale pole tip bulge.”

The co-inventors are Feng Liu, San Ramon, CA, Tao Pan, San Jose, CA, Zhigang Bai, Milpitas, CA, Yugang Wang, Milpitas, CA, and Sining Mao, Fremont, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A perpendicular magnetic recording head for use in a HDD drive has a main pole that has a main pole tip in proximity to an air bearing surface. The main pole tip has a first width at the ABS, extending distally at a first angle measured from the plane of the ABS to a second width measured at a first distance from the ABS. The main pole tip extends distally at a second angle measured from the plane of the ABS from the second width to a third width, wherein the second angle is less than the first angle. The main pole tip extends distally at a third angle measured from the plane of the ABS from the third width to a fourth width, wherein the third angle is greater than the second angle. The first distance is between 25 and 100nm.”

The patent application was filed on Dec. 8, 2011 (13/315,098).

Perpendicular magnetic disc
WD Media, San Jose, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,546,000) developed by Teiichiro Umezawa, Singapore, for a “perpendicular magnetic disc.”

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A perpendicular magnetic disk that includes, a base 110, a granular magnetic layer 160, and a auxiliary recording layer 180 disposed as an upper layer of the granular magnetic layer 160. The granular magnetic layer 160 has a granular structure in which a grain boundary portion is formed by segregation of a non-magnetic substance containing an oxide as a main component around magnetic particles containing a CoCrPt alloy grown in a columnar shape as a main component. The auxiliary recording layer 180 contains a CoCrPtRu alloy as a main component and has a film thickness of 1.5nm to 4.0nm. With this structure, the auxiliary recording layer can be thinned while maintaining the function thereof to improve SNR.”

The patent application was filed on April 28, 2011 (13/096,307).

Test ramp for testing microactuators used in multi-head disk drive
Western Digital Technologies, Irvine, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,499,652) developed by four co-inventors for a “test ramp for testing microactuators used in a multi-head disk drive.”

The co-inventors are Gregory Tran, Santa Clara, CA, Yanning Liu, San Ramon, CA, Sivabalan Ganisen, and Mukesh Patel, San Jose, CA.

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: “A test ramp is disclosed comprising a plurality of planar surfaces, wherein each planar surface comprises at least one impediment. Each impediment is offset along a planar axis from the other impediments, and each impediment is operable to contact part of a respective actuator arm of a disk drive in order to excite a microactuator coupled to the actuator arm.”

The patent application was filed on April 21, 2010 (12/764,800).