Signal-to-Noise Ratio in Heat-Assisted-Recording Media: A Comparison between Simulations and Experiments

We develop a code to extract the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) arising from the magnetic film in a recording medium. The approach allows us to separate the remanence and transition contributions from the global spatial noise. The results are in excellent agreement with the analysis performed on the same data sets by means of Seagate proprietary software based on ensemble wave-form analysis. We then apply this analytical approach to the results of heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR) dynamics simulations by means of the open-source multi-time-scale micromagnetic code MARS and compare these with experimental spin-stand measurements of analogous systems. The proposed model could be used as the standard tool to understand the underlying physics of the noise components affecting HAMR operations and how to decrease the noise arising from the medium to improve the writing performance of HAMR.