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102-589: The FIM-92 Stinger is an American man-portable air-defense system (MANPADS) that operates as an infrared homing surface-to-air missile (SAM). It can be adapted to fire from a wide variety of ground vehicles, and from helicopters and drones as the Air-to-Air Stinger (ATAS). It entered service in 1981 and is used by the militaries of the United States and 29 other countries. It is principally manufactured by Raytheon Missiles & Defense and

204-598: A Roketsan -made Stinger against either Russian or Syrian aircraft (or possibly against both). In February 2022, several countries announced that they were providing Stinger missiles to Ukrainian forces defending against the Russian invasion . Germany announced that it would provide 500 missiles. Denmark said that it will provide parts for 300 missiles, to be assembled in the United States. The Netherlands stated they would supply 200 units. Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, and

306-481: A Libyan bombardment on 10 September 1987 and shot down a Hercules transport aircraft on 7 July 1988. The Chadian government received Stinger missiles from the United States, when Libya invaded the northern part of the African country. On 8 October 1987, a Libyan Su-22MK was shot down by a FIM-92A fired by Chadian forces. The pilot, Capt. Diya al-Din, ejected and was captured. He was later granted political asylum by

408-632: A PC for firmware updates; for example, a digital audio player might be updated to support a new file format . Some hobbyists have taken advantage of this flexibility to reprogram consumer products for new purposes; for example, the iPodLinux and OpenWrt projects have enabled users to run full-featured Linux distributions on their MP3 players and wireless routers, respectively. ROM is also useful for binary storage of cryptographic data, as it makes them difficult to replace, which may be desirable in order to enhance information security . Since ROM (at least in hard-wired mask form) cannot be modified, it

510-562: A Russian general who claims the United States "greatly exaggerated" Soviet and Afghan aircraft losses during the war. According to Soviet figures, in 1987–1988, only 35 aircraft and 63 helicopters were destroyed by all causes. The Pakistan Army fired 28 Stingers at enemy aircraft with no kill. According to Soviet figures, by 25 December 1987, only 38 aircraft (airplanes, helicopters) were lost and 14 more were damaged by MANPADS ( Blowpipe or Stinger), or 10.2% kill probability. According to Crile, who includes information from Alexander Prokhanov ,

612-631: A Stinger. On 30 May, at about 11:00 a.m., an Aérospatiale SA 330 Puma helicopter was brought down by another missile, also fired by the SAS , in the vicinity of Mount Kent . Six Argentine National Gendarmerie Special Forces troops were killed and eight more wounded. The main MANPADS used by both sides during the Falklands War was the Blowpipe missile . In late 1985, several groups, such as Free

714-512: A bit line to a word line. Consequently, ROM could be implemented at a lower cost-per- bit than RAM for many years. Most home computers of the 1980s stored a BASIC interpreter or operating system in ROM as other forms of non-volatile storage such as magnetic disk drives were too costly. For example, the Commodore 64 included 64 KB of RAM and 20 KB of ROM containing a BASIC interpreter and

816-524: A company can simply order a large batch of fresh PROM chips and program them with the desired contents at its designers' convenience. The advent of the metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET), invented at Bell Labs in 1959, enabled the practical use of metal–oxide–semiconductor (MOS) transistors as memory cell storage elements in semiconductor memory , a function previously served by magnetic cores in computer memory . In 1967, Dawon Kahng and Simon Sze of Bell Labs proposed that

918-446: A heat source on an aircraft, typically the engine exhaust plume, and detonate a warhead in or near the heat source to disable the aircraft or to simply burst it into flames. These missiles use passive guidance , meaning that they do not emit heat signatures , making them difficult to detect by aircraft employing countermeasure systems. The first missiles deployed in the 1960s were infrared missiles. First generation MANPADS, such as

1020-605: A new focal plane array sensor to improve the missile's effectiveness in "high clutter" environments and increase the engagement range to about 25,000 feet (7,600 m). Production was scheduled for 2004, but was cancelled due to budget cuts. Since 1984 the Stinger has been issued to many U.S. Navy warships for point defense , particularly in Middle Eastern waters, with a three-man team that can perform other duties when not conducting Stinger training or maintenance. Until it

1122-411: A new role as a medium for mass storage or secondary storage of files. Mask ROM is a read-only memory whose contents are programmed by the integrated circuit manufacturer (rather than by the user). The desired memory contents are furnished by the customer to the device manufacturer. The desired data is converted into a custom photomask /mask layer for the final metallization of interconnections on

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1224-651: A new seeker, the FIM-92B, was produced from 1983 alongside the FIM-92A. Production of both the A and B types ended in 1987 with around 16,000 missiles produced. The replacement FIM-92C began development in 1984, and production began in 1987. The first examples were delivered to frontline units in 1989. C-type missiles were fitted with a reprogrammable microprocessor, allowing for incremental firmware updates. Later missiles designated D received improvements to improve their ability to defeat countermeasures, and later upgrades to

1326-561: A number of different countermeasure systems have been developed specifically to protect aircraft against the missiles. Although most MANPADS are owned and accounted for by governments, political upheavals and corruption have allowed thousands of them to enter the black market. In the years 1998–2018, at least 72 non-state groups have fielded MANPADS. Civilians in the United States cannot legally own MANPADS. Portions of this article were taken from Homeland Security: Protecting Airliners from Terrorist Missiles Archived 5 June 2008 at

1428-547: A previous DDA part is no longer being made. The old DDA will continue to be used in production up until stocks are exhausted, which is expected by 2026 when deliveries of Stingers with the new component are expected to begin. The Stinger's combat debut occurred during the Falklands War ( Spanish : Guerra de las Malvinas ) fought between the United Kingdom and Argentina. At the onset of the conflict soldiers of

1530-511: A specific part of the device, instead of the entire device. This can be done at high speed, hence the name "flash". All of these technologies improved the flexibility of ROM, but at a significant cost-per-chip, so that in large quantities mask ROM would remain an economical choice for many years. (Decreasing cost of reprogrammable devices had almost eliminated the market for mask ROM by the year 2000.) Rewriteable technologies were envisioned as replacements for mask ROM. The most recent development

1632-416: A technical level the gains have been achieved by increasing parallelism both in controller design and of storage, the use of large DRAM read/write caches and the implementation of memory cells which can store more than one bit (DLC, TLC and MLC). The latter approach is more failure prone but this has been largely mitigated by overprovisioning (the inclusion of spare capacity in a product which is visible only to

1734-506: A threat to low-flying aircraft , especially helicopters and also used against low-flying cruise missiles . These short-range missiles can also be fired from vehicles, tripods, weapon platforms, and warships. MANPADS were developed in the 1950s to provide military ground forces with protection from jet aircraft. They have received a great deal of attention, partly because armed terrorist groups have used them against commercial airliners. These missiles, affordable and widely available through

1836-406: A variety of other devices. In particular, many microprocessors have mask ROM to store their microcode . Some microcontrollers have mask ROM to store the bootloader or all of their firmware . Classic mask-programmed ROM chips are integrated circuits that physically encode the data to be stored, and thus it is impossible to change their contents after fabrication. It is also possible to write

1938-454: A variety of sources, have been used successfully over the past three decades, both in military conflicts, by militant groups, and by terrorist organizations. Twenty-five countries, including the China, Iran, Poland, Russia, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States produce man-portable air defense systems. Possession, export, and trafficking of such weapons is tightly controlled, due to

2040-436: Is NAND flash , also invented at Toshiba. Its designers explicitly broke from past practice, stating plainly that "the aim of NAND flash is to replace hard disks ," rather than the traditional use of ROM as a form of non-volatile primary storage . As of 2021 , NAND has nearly completely achieved this goal by offering throughput higher than hard disks, lower latency, higher tolerance of physical shock, extreme miniaturization (in

2142-500: Is 5.0 ft (1.52 m) long and 2.8 in (70 mm) in diameter, with 3.9 in (100 mm) fins. The missile itself weighs 22 lb (10.1 kg), while the missile with its launch tube and integral sight, fitted with a gripstock and identification friend or foe (IFF) antenna, weighs approximately 34 lb (15.2 kg). It has a targeting range of up to 15,700 feet (4,800 m) and can engage low-altitude enemy threats at up to 12,500 feet (3,800 m). The Stinger

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2244-486: Is believed one Sukhoi Su-24 was shot down by a Stinger missile during the Second Chechen War . The Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam also managed to acquire one or several Stingers, possibly from former Mujahideen stocks, and used at least one to down a Sri Lanka Air Force Mi-24 on 10 November 1997. In 2000, the U.S. inventory contained 13,400 missiles. The total cost of the program is $ 7,281,000,000. It

2346-407: Is common practice to use rewritable non-volatile memory – such as UV- EPROM or EEPROM – for the development phase of a project, and to switch to mask ROM when the code has been finalized. For example, Atmel microcontrollers come in both EEPROM and mask ROM formats. The main advantage of mask ROM is its cost. Per bit, mask ROM was more compact than any other kind of semiconductor memory . Since

2448-450: Is launched by a small ejection motor that pushes it a safe distance from the operator before engaging the main two-stage solid-fuel sustainer, which accelerates it to a maximum speed of Mach 2.54 (1,930 mph; 864 m/s). The warhead contains 2.25 lb (1.02 kg) of HTA-3 (a mix of HMX , TNT , and aluminium powder) explosive with an impact fuze and a self-destruct timer that functions 17 seconds after launch. To fire

2550-413: Is only suitable for storing data which is not expected to need modification for the life of the device. To that end, ROM has been used in many computers to store look-up tables for the evaluation of mathematical and logical functions (for example, a floating-point unit might tabulate the sine function in order to facilitate faster computation). This was especially effective when CPUs were slow and ROM

2652-553: Is planned to be awarded by 2026. The request for information to interested firms only went out in April 2022, and RTX and Lockheed Martin were selected to competitively develop the Stinger replacement in September 2023. According to Reuters, the U.S. government has signed a contract for 1,468 Stingers worth a total of $ 687 million, to replenish stock sent to Ukraine. Raytheon Chief Executive Greg Hayes said on 26 April 2022: "Some of

2754-587: Is produced under license by Airbus Defence and Space in Germany and by Roketsan in Turkey . The FIM-92 Stinger is a passive surface-to-air missile that can be shoulder-fired by a single operator (although standard military procedure calls for two operators – team chief and gunner). The Stinger was intended to supplant the FIM-43 Redeye system, the principal difference being that, unlike

2856-589: Is rumored that the United States Secret Service has Stinger missiles to defend the President, a notion that has never been dispelled; however, U.S. Secret Service plans favor moving the President to a safer place in the event of an attack rather than shooting down the plane, lest the missile (or the wreckage of the target aircraft) hit innocents. During the 1980s, the Stinger was used to support different US-aligned guerrilla forces, notably

2958-415: Is still applied to images of newer games distributed on CD-ROMs or other optical media. ROM images of commercial games, firmware, etc. usually contain copyrighted software. The unauthorized copying and distribution of copyrighted software is a violation of copyright laws in many jurisdictions, although duplication for backup purposes may be considered fair use depending on location. In any case, there

3060-452: Is stored, usually Flash memory ) and RAM. ROM and RAM are essential components of a computer, each serving distinct roles. RAM, or Random Access Memory, is a temporary, volatile storage medium that loses data when the system powers down. In contrast, ROM, being non-volatile, preserves its data even after the computer is switched off. IBM used capacitor read-only storage (CROS) and transformer read-only storage (TROS) to store microcode for

3162-541: Is typically only possible a certain number of times. The term "ROM" is sometimes used to refer to a ROM device containing specific software or a file with software to be stored in a writable ROM device. For example, users modifying or replacing the Android operating system describe files containing a modified or replacement operating system as " custom ROMs " after the type of storage the file used to be written to, and they may distinguish between ROM (where software and data

FIM-92 Stinger - Misplaced Pages Continue

3264-511: Is used to store the basic bootstrapping firmware for the processor, as well as the various firmware needed to internally control self-contained devices such as graphic cards , hard disk drives , solid-state drives , optical disc drives , TFT screens , etc., in the system. Today, many of these "read-only" memories – especially the BIOS / UEFI – are often replaced with EEPROM or Flash memory (see below), to permit in-place reprogramming should

3366-477: The British Army 's Special Air Service (SAS) had been clandestinely equipped with six missiles, although they had received little instruction in their use. The sole SAS trooper who had received training on the system, and was due to train other troops, was killed in a helicopter crash on 19 May. Nonetheless, on 21 May 1982 an SAS soldier engaged and shot down an Argentine Pucará ground attack aircraft with

3468-651: The Electrotechnical Laboratory in 1972, went a long way to solving problem 4, since an EEPROM can be programmed in-place if the containing device provides a means to receive the program contents from an external source (for example, a personal computer via a serial cable ). Flash memory , invented by Fujio Masuoka at Toshiba in the early 1980s and commercialized in the late 1980s, is a form of EEPROM that makes very efficient use of chip area and can be erased and reprogrammed thousands of times without damage. It permits erasure and programming of only

3570-697: The FIM-43 Redeye are regarded as straddling the first and second generations as they are gas-cooled but still use a spin-scan seeker. Third generation infrared MANPADS, such as the French Mistral , the Soviet 9K38 Igla , and the US Stinger B , use rosette scanning detectors to produce a quasi-image of the target. Their seeker compares input from multiple detections bands, either two widely separated IR bands or IR and UV , giving them much greater ability to discern and reject countermeasures deployed by

3672-632: The KERNAL operating system. Later home or office computers such as the IBM PC XT often included magnetic disk drives, and larger amounts of RAM, allowing them to load their operating systems from disk into RAM, with only a minimal hardware initialization core and bootloader remaining in ROM (known as the BIOS in IBM-compatible computers). This arrangement allowed for a more complex and easily upgradeable operating system. In modern PCs, "ROM"

3774-504: The Redeye and FIM-92A, which have IR-only. While modern flares can have an IR signature that is closely matched to the launching aircraft's engine exhaust, there is a readily distinguishable difference in UV signature between flares and jet engines. The Stinger-RMP is so-called because of its ability to load a new set of software via ROM chip inserted in the grip at the depot. If this download to

3876-651: The Soviet–Afghan War in the 1980s cite Afghan mujahedin as being disappointed with the British-supplied Blowpipe CLOS missile because it was too difficult to learn to use and highly inaccurate, particularly when employed against fast-moving jet aircraft. Given these considerations, many experts believe that CLOS missiles are not as ideally suited for untrained personnel use as IR missiles, which sometimes are referred to as "fire and forget" missiles. Later versions of CLOS missiles, such as

3978-732: The Stanford Web Archive , CRS Report for Congress RL31741, February 16, 2006 by the Congressional Research Service, division of The Library of Congress which as a work of the Federal Government exists in the public domain. Read-only memory Strictly speaking, read-only memory refers to hard-wired memory, such as diode matrix or a mask ROM integrated circuit (IC), that cannot be electronically changed after manufacture. Although discrete circuits can be altered in principle, through

4080-835: The Wassenaar Arrangement 's (WA)22 Elements for Export Controls of MANPADS , the G8 Action Plan of 2 June 2003, the October 2003 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit, Bangkok Declaration on Partnership for the Future and in July 2003 the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Forum for Security Co-operation, Decision No. 7/03: Man-portable Air Defense Systems . Understanding

4182-512: The floating gate of a MOS semiconductor device could be used for the cell of a reprogrammable ROM, which led to Dov Frohman of Intel inventing erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM) in 1971. The 1971 invention of EPROM essentially solved problem 3, since EPROM (unlike PROM) can be repeatedly reset to its unprogrammed state by exposure to strong ultraviolet light. Electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM), developed by Yasuo Tarui, Yutaka Hayashi and Kiyoko Naga at

FIM-92 Stinger - Misplaced Pages Continue

4284-527: The northwestern offensive launched in December 2019 by the Syrian regime (backed by Russia, Iran and Hezbollah ), Russian and Syrian aircraft (variously reportedly as Russian Su-34s and Syrian Su-22 ) attacked a Turkish military convoy near Idlib , killing 36 Turkish soldiers. That day, video footage emerged of alleged Turkish soldiers (backing Syrian opposition fighters) firing what apparently looks like

4386-418: The 1960s, both ROM and its mutable counterpart static RAM were implemented as arrays of transistors in silicon chips; however, a ROM memory cell could be implemented using fewer transistors than an SRAM memory cell, since the latter needs a latch (comprising 5-20 transistors) to retain its contents, while a ROM cell might consist of the absence (logical 0) or presence (logical 1) of one transistor connecting

4488-466: The 1989 Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, the U.S. attempted to buy back the Stinger missiles , with a $ 55 million program launched in 1990 to buy back around 300 missiles (US$ 183,300 each). The U.S. government collected most of the Stingers it had delivered, but by 1996 around 600 were unaccounted for and some found their way into Croatia , Iran , Sri Lanka , Qatar , and North Korea . According to

4590-862: The Afghan Mujahidins, the Chad government against the Libyan invasion and the Angolan UNITA. The Nicaraguan contras were not provided with Stingers due to the lack of fixed wing aircraft of the Sandinista government, as such the previous generation FIM-43 Redeye was considered adequate. In the Syrian civil war , Turkey reportedly helped to transport a limited amount of FIM-92 Stingers to the Free Syrian Army . On 27 February 2020, during

4692-635: The Block I in service until 2030. With the arsenal declining from obsolescence, on 10 November 2020 the U.S. Army issued a request for information for a replacement MANPADS. The new system will be compatible with the Stinger Vehicle Universal Launcher used on the IM-SHORAD and be able to defeat fixed and rotary-wing aircraft, as well as Group 2 and 3 UAS as well as or better than the Stinger. A contract for up to 8,000 missiles

4794-469: The British Javelin , use a solid-state television camera in lieu of the optical tracker to make the gunner's task easier. The Javelin's manufacturer, Thales Air Defence , claims that their missile is virtually impervious to countermeasures. Laser guided MANPADS use beam-riding guidance where a sensor in the missile's tail detects the emissions from a laser on the launcher and attempts to steer

4896-589: The CIA had to pass all of its funding and weapons to the Mujahideen. President Zia constantly had to gauge how much he could "make the pot boil" in Afghanistan without provoking a Soviet invasion of his own country. According to George Crile III, U.S. Representative Charlie Wilson 's relationship with Zia was instrumental in the final go-ahead for the Stinger introduction. Wilson and his associates at first viewed

4998-878: The CIA, already in August 1988 the U.S. had demanded from Qatar the return of Stinger missiles. Wilson later told CBS he "lived in terror" that a civilian airliner would be shot down by a Stinger, but he did not have misgivings about having provided Stingers to defeat the Soviets. The story of the Stingers in Afghanistan was popularly told in the media by Western sources primarily, notably in Charlie Wilson's War by George Crile , and Ghost Wars by Steve Coll . The Reagan administration provided 310 Stingers to Jonas Savimbi 's UNITA movement in Angola between 1986 and 1989. As in Afghanistan, efforts to recover missiles after

5100-560: The D were designated G. The FIM-92E or Stinger RMP Block I was developed from 1992 and delivered from 1995 (certain sources state that the FIM-92D is also part of the Block I development). The main changes were again in the sensor and the software, improving the missile's performance against low-signature targets. A software upgrade in 2001 was designated FIM-92F. The development of the Stinger RMP Block II began in 1996 using

5202-883: The Eagle , began arguing the CIA was not doing enough to support the Mujahideen in the Soviet–Afghan War . Michael Pillsbury , Vincent Cannistraro , and others put enormous bureaucratic pressure on the CIA to provide the Stinger to the rebels. The idea was controversial because up to that point, the CIA had been operating with the pretense that the United States was not involved in the war directly, for various reasons. All weapons supplied up to that point were non-U.S. sourced weapons, including Kalashnikov style assault rifles made in China and Egypt . The final say-so came down to President General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq of Pakistan, through whom

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5304-510: The French government. During the recovery operation, a Libyan MiG-23MS was shot down by a FIM-92A. Tajik Islamist opposition forces operating from Afghanistan during the 1992–97 Tajik civil war encountered a heavy air campaign launched by Russia and Uzbekistan to prop up the government in Dushanbe that included border and cross-border raids. During one of these operations, a Sukhoi Su-24 M

5406-412: The Mujahideen gunners used the supplied Stingers to score approximately 269 total aircraft kills in about 340 engagements, a 79% kill probability. If this report is accurate, Stingers would be responsible for over half of the 451 Soviet aircraft losses in Afghanistan . But these statistics are based on Mujahideen self-reporting, which is of unknown reliability. Selig Harrison rejects such figures, quoting

5508-466: The ROM chips, and the presence or absence of these features will represent either a 1 or a 0 bit, depending on the ROM design. Thus by design, any attempts to electronically change the data will fail, since the data is defined by the presence or absence of physical features or structures that cannot be electronically changed. For every software program, even for revisions of the same program, the entire mask must be changed, which can be costly. In mask ROM,

5610-518: The Redeye ran from 1969 to 1982, with a total production of around 85,000 missiles. The program was accepted for further development as Redeye II by the U.S. Army in 1971 and designated FIM-92; the Stinger appellation was chosen in 1972. Because of technical difficulties that dogged testing, the first shoulder launch was not until mid-1975. Production of the FIM-92A began in 1978. An improved Stinger with

5712-534: The Redeye, the Stinger can acquire the target from head-on, giving much more time to acquire and destroy the target. The FIM-92B missile can also be fired from the M1097 Avenger and the M6 Linebacker . The missile is also capable of being deployed from a Humvee Stinger rack and can be used by airborne troops. A helicopter launched version exists and is called Air-to-Air Stinger (ATAS). The missile

5814-606: The Stinger as "just adding another component to the lethal mix we were building." Their increasingly successful Afghanistan strategy, formed largely by Michael G. Vickers , was based on a broad mix of weapons, tactics, and logistics, not a ' silver bullet solution' of a single weapon. Furthermore, the previous attempts to provide MANPADs to the Mujahideen, namely the SA-7 and Blowpipe , hadn't worked very well. Engineer Ghaffar, of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar 's Hezb-i-Islami , brought down

5916-406: The Stinger was a "turning point". Milt Bearden saw it as a " force multiplier " and morale booster. Representative Charlie Wilson, the politician behind Operation Cyclone, described the first Stinger Mi-24 shootdowns in 1986 as one of the three crucial moments of his experience in the war, saying "we never really won a set-piece battle before September 26, and then we never lost one afterwards." He

6018-590: The US Redeye , early versions of the Soviet 9K32 Strela-2 , and the Chinese HN-5 (A copy of the Soviet Strela-2), are considered "tail-chase weapons" as their uncooled spin-scan seekers can only discern the superheated interior of the target's jet engine from background noise. This means they are only capable of accurately tracking the aircraft from the rear when the engines are fully exposed to

6120-414: The United States each stated that they would provide undisclosed amounts. By 7 March, the U.S. reported that it and its NATO allies had together sent more than 2,000 Stinger missiles to Ukraine. In late April 2022, Raytheon Technologies CEO Greg Hayes told investors that the company was experiencing supply chain issues and would not be able to ramp up production of Stinger missiles until 2023. This delay

6222-546: The addition of bodge wires and the removal or replacement of components, ICs cannot. Correction of errors, or updates to the software, require new devices to be manufactured and to replace the installed device. Floating-gate ROM semiconductor memory in the form of erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (EEPROM) and flash memory can be erased and re-programmed. But usually, this can only be done at relatively slow speeds, may require special equipment to achieve, and

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6324-425: The components are no longer commercially available, and so we're going to have to go out and redesign some of the electronics in the missile of the seeker head. That's going to take us a little bit of time". In January 2023, the U.S. Army said it expected to increase Stinger production to 60 missiles per month by 2025, an increase of 50% from the current rate. The Dual Detector Assembly (DDA) will be redesigned because

6426-423: The contents of a Laser ROM by using a laser to alter the electrical properties of only some diodes on the ROM, or by using a laser to cut only some polysilicon links, instead of using a mask. By applying write protection , some types of reprogrammable ROMs may temporarily become read-only memory. There are other types of non-volatile memory which are not based on solid-state IC technology, including: Although

6528-660: The cost of an integrated circuit strongly depends on its size, mask ROM is significantly cheaper than any other kind of semiconductor memory. However, the one-time masking cost is high and there is a long turn-around time from design to product phase. Design errors are costly: if an error in the data or code is found, the mask ROM is useless and must be replaced in order to change the code or data. As of 2003 , four companies produce most such mask ROM chips: Samsung Electronics , NEC Corporation , Oki Electric Industry , and Macronix . Some integrated circuits contain only mask ROM. Other integrated circuits contain mask ROM as well as

6630-463: The data is physically encoded in the circuit, so it can only be programmed during fabrication. This leads to a number of serious disadvantages: Subsequent developments have addressed these shortcomings. Programmable read-only memory (PROM), invented by Wen Tsing Chow in 1956, allowed users to program its contents exactly once by physically altering its structure with the application of high-voltage pulses. This addressed problems 1 and 2 above, since

6732-453: The drive controller) and by increasingly sophisticated read/write algorithms in drive firmware. Because they are written by forcing electrons through a layer of electrical insulation onto a floating transistor gate , rewriteable ROMs can withstand only a limited number of write and erase cycles before the insulation is permanently damaged. In the earliest EPROMs, this might occur after as few as 1,000 write cycles, while in modern Flash EEPROM

6834-577: The end of hostilities proved incomplete. The battery of a Stinger lasts for four or five years, so any battery supplied in the 1980s would now be inoperative but during the Syrian Civil War , insurgents showed how easily they switched to different batteries, including common car batteries, as power sources for several MANPADS models. The French army used 15 firing positions and 30 missiles purchased in 1983 for operations in Chad. The 35th Parachute Artillery Regiment made an unsuccessful fire during

6936-418: The endurance may exceed 1,000,000. The limited endurance, as well as the higher cost per bit, means that Flash-based storage is unlikely to completely supplant magnetic disk drives in the near future. The timespan over which a ROM remains accurately readable is not limited by write cycling. The data retention of EPROM, EAROM, EEPROM, and Flash may be time-limited by charge leaking from the floating gates of

7038-430: The first Hind gunship with a Stinger on 25 September 1986 near Jalalabad . As part of Operation Cyclone , the CIA eventually supplied nearly 500 Stingers (some sources claim 1,500–2,000) to the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, and 250 launchers. The impact of the Stinger on the outcome of the war is contested, particularly in the translation between the impact on the tactical battlefield to the strategic level withdrawal, and

7140-721: The form of USB flash drives and tiny microSD memory cards , for example), and much lower power consumption. Many stored-program computers use a form of non-volatile storage (that is, storage that retains its data when power is removed) to store the initial program that runs when the computer is powered on or otherwise begins execution (a process known as bootstrapping , often abbreviated to " booting " or "booting up"). Likewise, every non-trivial computer needs some form of mutable memory to record changes in its state as it executes. Forms of read-only memory were employed as non-volatile storage for programs in most early stored-program computers, such as ENIAC after 1948 . (Until then it

7242-461: The influence the first had on the second. Dr. Robert F. Baumann (of the Staff College at Fort Leavenworth ) described its impact on "Soviet tactical operations" as "unmistakable". This opinion was shared by Yossef Bodansky. Soviet, and later, Russian, accounts give little significance to the Stinger for strategically ending the war. According to the 1993 U.S. Air Defense Artillery Yearbook,

7344-442: The integrated circuit, although fuse re-growth was once a problem in some systems. The contents of ROM chips can be extracted with special hardware devices and relevant controlling software. This practice is common for, as a main example, reading the contents of older video game console cartridges . Another example is making backups of firmware/OS ROMs from older computers or other devices - for archival purposes, as in many cases,

7446-499: The invention of the integrated circuit came mask ROM . Mask ROM consists of a grid of word lines (the address input) and bit lines (the data output), selectively joined with transistor switches, and can represent an arbitrary look-up table with a regular physical layout and predictable propagation delay . Mask ROM is programmed with photomasks in photolithography during semiconductor manufacturing . The mask defines physical features or structures that will be removed, or added in

7548-585: The launcher itself, with the user only having to make coarse aim corrections. Because there are no radio data links from the ground to the missile, the missile cannot be effectively jammed after it is launched. Even though beam-riding missiles require relatively extensive training and skill to operate, many experts consider these missiles particularly menacing due to the missiles' resistance to most conventional countermeasures in use today. Over fifty MANPADS attacks on civilian aircraft are on record to 2007. Thirty-three aircraft were shot down killing over 800 people in

7650-475: The memory cell transistors. Early generation EEPROM's, in the mid-1980s generally cited 5 or 6 year data retention. A review of EEPROM's offered in the year 2020 shows manufacturers citing 100 year data retention. Adverse environments will reduce the retention time (leakage is accelerated by high temperatures or radiation ). Masked ROM and fuse/antifuse PROM do not suffer from this effect, as their data retention depends on physical rather than electrical permanence of

7752-548: The memory chip (hence the name). Mask ROM can be made in several ways, all of which aim to change the electrical response of a transistor when it is addressed on a grid, such as: Mask ROM transistors can be arranged in either NOR or NAND configurations and can achieve one of the smallest cell sizes possible as each bit is represented by only one transistor. NAND offers higher storage density than NOR. OR configurations are also possible, but compared to NOR it only connects transistors to V cc instead of V ss . Mask ROMs used to be

7854-585: The military arsenals of the former dictator Saddam Hussein , and in Afghanistan as well. In August 2010, a report by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) confirmed that "only a handful" of illicit MANPADS were recovered from national resistance caches in Iraq in 2009, according to media reports and interviews with military sources. With the growing number of MANPADS attacks on civilian airliners,

7956-438: The missile fails during power-up, basic functionality runs off the onboard ROM. The four-processor RMP has 4 KB of RAM for each processor . Since the downloaded code runs from RAM, there is little space to spare, particularly for processors dedicated to seeker input processing and target analysis. The missile began as a program by General Dynamics to produce an improved variant of their 1967 FIM-43 Redeye . Production of

8058-451: The missile has not been fired. The BCUs are somewhat sensitive to abuse and have a limited shelf life due to argon leakage. The IFF system receives power from a rechargeable battery , which is part of the IFF interrogator box, which plugs into the base of the gripstock's pistol grip. Guidance to the target is initially through proportional navigation , then switches to another mode that directs

8160-422: The missile to fly at the exact middle of the beam, or between two beams. Missiles such as Sweden's RBS-70 and Britain's Starstreak can engage aircraft from all angles and only require the operator to continuously track the target using a joystick to keep the laser aim point on the target: the latest version of RBS 70 features a tracking engagement mode where fine aim adjustments of the laser emitter are handled by

8262-530: The missile towards the target airframe instead of its exhaust plume . There are three main variants in use: the Stinger Basic, Stinger-Passive Optical Seeker Technique (POST), and Stinger-Reprogrammable Microprocessor (RMP). These correspond to the FIM-92A, FIM-92B, and FIM-92C and later variants respectively. The POST and RMP variants have a dual-detector seeker: IR and UV . This allows it to distinguish targets from countermeasures much better than

8364-461: The missile's seeker and provide a sufficient thermal signature for engagement. First generation IR missiles are also highly susceptible to interfering thermal signatures from background sources, including the sun, which many experts feel makes them somewhat unreliable, and they are prone to erratic behaviour in the terminal phase of engagement. While less effective than more modern weapons, they remain common in irregular forces as they are not limited by

8466-404: The missile, a BCU (Battery Coolant Unit) is inserted into the gripstock. This device consists of a supply of high-pressure gaseous argon , which is injected into the seeker to cryogenically cool it to operating temperature, and a thermal battery , which provides power for target acquisition: a single BCU provides power and coolant for roughly 45 seconds, after which another must be inserted if

8568-616: The missiles, along with night operation and terrain-hugging tactics to prevent the rebels from getting a clear shot. By 1988, Kuperman states, the Mujahideen had all but stopped firing them. Another source ( Jonathan Steele ) states that Stingers forced Soviet helicopters and ground attack planes to bomb from higher altitudes with less accuracy, but did not bring down many more aircraft than Chinese heavy machine guns and other less sophisticated anti-aircraft weaponry. The last Stingers were supplied in 1988 after increasing reports of fighters selling them to Iran and thawing relations with Moscow. After

8670-417: The most inexpensive, and are the simplest semiconductor memory devices, with only one metal layer and one polysilicon layer, making it the type of semiconductor memory with the highest manufacturing yield (the highest number of working devices per manufacturing run). ROM can be made using one of several semiconductor device fabrication technologies such as CMOS , nMOS , pMOS , and bipolar transistors . It

8772-405: The movement of jumper plugs to apply write-enable signals, and special lock/unlock command codes. Modern NAND Flash can be used to achieve the highest write speeds of any rewritable ROM technology, with speeds as high as 10 GB / s in an SSD. This has been enabled by the increased investment in both consumer and enterprise solid-state drives and flash memory products for higher end mobile devices. On

8874-858: The need for a firmware upgrade arise. However, simple and mature sub-systems (such as the keyboard or some communication controllers in the integrated circuits on the main board, for example) may employ mask ROM or OTP (one-time programmable). ROM and successor technologies such as flash are prevalent in embedded systems . These are in everything from industrial robots to home appliances and consumer electronics ( MP3 players , set-top boxes , etc.) all of which are designed for specific functions, but are based on general-purpose microprocessors . With software usually tightly coupled to hardware, program changes are rarely needed in such devices (which typically lack hard disks for reasons of cost, size, or power consumption). As of 2008, most products use Flash rather than mask ROM, and many provide some means for connecting to

8976-459: The original chips are PROMs and thus at risk of exceeding their usable data lifetime. The resultant memory dump files are known as ROM images or abbreviated ROMs , and can be used to produce duplicate ROMs - for example to produce new cartridges or as digital files for playing in console emulators . The term ROM image originated when most console games were distributed on cartridges containing ROM chips, but achieved such widespread usage that it

9078-575: The problem in 2003, Colin Powell remarked that there was "no threat more serious to aviation" than the missiles, which can be used to shoot down helicopters and commercial airliners, and are sold illegally for as little as a few hundred dollars. The U.S. has led a global effort to dismantle these weapons, with over 30,000 voluntarily destroyed since 2003, but probably thousands are still in the hands of insurgents, especially in Iraq , where they were looted from

9180-399: The process. On 10 October 2022, during the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine , Ukrainian forces were recorded allegedly shooting down a Russian cruise missile using MANPADS. Since then, other instances have been videoed and shared on social media platforms. Man-portable air defense systems are a popular black market item for insurgent forces. Their proliferation became the subject of

9282-443: The relative speed of RAM vs. ROM has varied over time, as of 2007 large RAM chips can be read faster than most ROMs. For this reason (and to allow uniform access), ROM content is sometimes copied to RAM or shadowed before its first use, and subsequently read from RAM. For those types of ROM that can be electrically modified, writing speed has traditionally been much slower than reading speed, and it may need unusually high voltage,

9384-545: The short shelf-life of gas coolant cartridges used by later systems. Second generation infrared missiles, such as early versions of the U.S. Stinger , the Soviet Strela-3 , and the Chinese FN-6 , use gas-cooled seeker heads and a conical scanning technique, which enables the seeker to filter out most interfering background IR sources as well as permitting head-on and side engagement profiles. Later versions of

9486-583: The smaller System/360 models, the 360/85 , and the initial two System/370 models ( 370/155 and 370/165 ). On some models there was also a writeable control store (WCS) for additional diagnostics and emulation support. The Apollo Guidance Computer used core rope memory , programmed by threading wires through magnetic cores. The simplest type of solid-state ROM is as old as the semiconductor technology itself. Combinational logic gates can be joined manually to map n -bit address input onto arbitrary values of m -bit data output (a look-up table ). With

9588-465: The target aircraft. Fourth generation missiles, such as the canceled American FIM-92 Stinger Block 2 , Russian Verba , Chinese QW-4 , Indian VSHORAD and Japanese Type 91 surface-to-air missile use imaging infrared focal plane array guidance systems and other advanced sensor systems, which permit engagement at greater ranges. Command guidance (CLOS) missiles do not home in on a particular aspect (heat source or radio or radar transmissions) of

9690-478: The targeted aircraft. Instead, the missile operator or gunner visually acquires the target using a magnified optical sight and then uses radio controls to "fly" the missile into the aircraft. One of the benefits of such a missile is that it is virtually immune to flares and other basic countermeasure systems that are designed primarily to defeat IR missiles. The major drawback of CLOS missiles is that they require highly trained and skilled operators. Numerous reports from

9792-519: The threat they pose to civil aviation , although such efforts have not always been successful. The missiles are about 1.5 to 1.8 m (5 to 6 ft) in length and weigh about 17 to 18 kg (37 to 40 lb), depending on the model. MANPADS generally have a target detection range of about 10 km (6 mi) and an engagement range of about 6 km (4 mi), so aircraft flying at 6,100 metres (20,000 ft) or higher are relatively safe. Infrared homing missiles are designed to home-in on

9894-575: Was cheap compared to RAM. Notably, the display adapters of early personal computers stored tables of bitmapped font characters in ROM. This usually meant that the text display font could not be changed interactively. This was the case for both the CGA and MDA adapters available with the IBM PC XT. The use of ROM to store such small amounts of data has disappeared almost completely in modern general-purpose computers. However, NAND Flash has taken over

9996-502: Was decommissioned in September 1993, the U.S. Navy had at least one Stinger Gunnery Detachment attached to Beachmaster Unit Two in Little Creek Virginia. The sailors of this detachment would deploy to carrier battlegroups in teams of two to four sailors per ship as requested by Battle Group Commanders. The original Stinger's reprogrammable microprocessor has become obsolete in 2023, and a service life extension will keep

10098-424: Was given the first spent Stinger tube as a gift and kept it on his office wall. That launch tube is now on exhibit at the U.S. Army Air Defense Artillery Museum, Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Other military analysts tend to be dismissive of the impact of the Stinger. According to Alan J. Kuperman , the Stingers did make an impact at first but within a few months flares, beacons, and exhaust baffles were installed to disorient

10200-598: Was in part due to the fact the Stinger was scheduled to be replaced in the 2020s and thus contained obsolete components, which have to be redesigned for modern procurement. As of 11 May 2024, the U.S. had sent a quarter of its aging Stinger missile stockpile to Ukraine. On 20 August 2022, Russia supplied a single Stinger to Iran, for them to attempt reverse engineering the modern version of it. Man-portable air-defense system Man-portable air-defense systems ( MANPADS or MPADS ) are portable shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles . They are guided weapons and are

10302-408: Was not a stored-program computer as every program had to be manually wired into the machine, which could take days to weeks.) Read-only memory was simpler to implement since it needed only a mechanism to read stored values, and not to change them in-place, and thus could be implemented with very crude electromechanical devices (see historical examples below). With the advent of integrated circuits in

10404-562: Was shot down on 3 May 1993 with a Stinger fired by the opposition. Both Russian pilots were rescued. Russian officials claimed several times that the Chechen militia and insurgents possessed US-made Stinger missiles. They attributed a few of their aerial losses to the American MANPADS. The presence of such missiles was confirmed by photo evidence, and were said to originate from Afghan smuggling routes that passed through Georgia. It

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