Write equalization (WE), used extensively in tape recording systems, has of
fered many improvements to the recording channel. These include improved re
solution, better overwrite, and reduced distortion. As linear density in th
ese systems has increased with the use of thinner metal-particle (MP) media
, which significantly improves read nonlinearity in magnetoresistive (MR) h
eads, it is not clear that the effects of the WE scheme are still advantage
ous. In this paper, the impact that WE has on high-density advanced particu
late recording systems is investigated. It is found that surface roughness
is much more detrimental to recordings using WE because of the higher frequ
ency behavior and reduced channel output of the recording scheme.