Twenty tellurium air sandwiches were assembled in a new dedicated clean room. Preliminary tests of the sandwiches indicate acceptable characteristics for digital recording. The recorder prototype is now operational. The Philips Research Laboratories (PRL) recorder has been used for routine materials evaluation. No degradation of tellurium films has been observed after 3,000 hours at 90 C. The backup turntable and sled assembled from commercially available components were tested and found acceptable for digital recording applications. The tasks of data modulation and error encoding/decoding are proceeding well.