In-situ NFT pre-treatment to accumulate optically transparent material on NFT to improve reliability

A method, comprising:

• pretreating a magnetic recording head with a silicon based material without writing data to a magnetic media;
• writing data to the magnetic media using the magnetic recording head;
• cleaning the magnetic recording head to remove optically absorbing containing material;
• and
• retreating the magnetic recording head with the silicon based material.

A magnetic media drive, comprising:

• a control unit configured to:
• perform one or more write operations with a magnetic recording head;
• detect that the magnetic recording head has an absorbing smear after performing the one or more write operations;
• cause the absorbing smear to be removed upon detecting that the magnetic recording head has the absorbing smear;
• cause a non-absorbing smear to be deposited on the magnetic recording head after causing the absorbing smear to be removed;
• and
• resume write operations with the magnetic recording head.

A magnetic media drive, comprising:

• a magnetic recording head;
• a magnetic media;
• and
• a control unit coupled to the magnetic recording head and the magnetic media, wherein the control unit is configured to:
• cause an optically absorbing smear to be removed from a magnetic recording head;
• cause a transparent smear to be applied to the magnetic recording head, wherein the applying occurs at a first temperature without writing data to a magnetic recording media;
• and
• cause data to be written to the magnetic media, wherein the writing occurs at a second temperature, the second temperature being greater than the first temperature.

A method, comprising:

• removing an optically absorbing smear from a magnetic recording head;
• applying a non-absorbing smear to the magnetic recording head, wherein the applying occurs at a first temperature and a first power level without writing data to a magnetic recording media;
• and
• writing data to the magnetic recording media, wherein the writing occurs at a second temperature and a second power level, the second temperature being greater than the first temperature and the second power level being greater than the first power level.