Requirements of ultrathin carbon coatings for magnetic storage technology

Diamond-like carbon (DLC) is presently used as protective coating on disks, heads and sliders used in magnetic disk storage technology. The rapidly increasing storage density will soon require carbon films of only 2 nm thickness. Carbon films are now made by sputtering, but it is unlikely that this method can provide the continuous 2 nm films needed in future. This paper describes methods to produce thinner films, such as filtered cathodic vacuum arc (FCVA) and plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PECVD) methods. Various characterisation methods such as Raman and X-ray reflectivity are described and compared.