Multimedia instruction set for wide data paths

A mediaprocessor formed on an integrated circuit chip, the mediaprocessor comprising:

• a functional processing unit;
• microcode for a partitioned sigma instruction;
• on-chip memory for storing a partitioned sigma instruction to be executed entirely on said functional processing unit, wherein the partitioned sigma instruction operates on a first data operand and a second data operand with a result being stored in a destination operand;
• on-chip data memory for storing the first data operand and the second data operand of the stored partitioned sigma instruction, each one of the first data operand and second data operand having a common bit length, the first data operand being partitioned into a plurality of partitions, each partition of the first data operand comprising a first number of first-data-operand subwords, the second data operand comprising at least one partition which in turn comprises a second number of second data-operand subwords, wherein the first number and the second number are equal, and wherein there are more partitions of the first data operand than of the second data operand, and wherein the destination operand is partitioned into a plurality of partitions, wherein there are a common number of partitions in the first data operand and the destination operand;
• wherein for each one subword of the first number of first-data-operand subwords, an interim result is achieved from a first operation performed between said one subword and a corresponding one subword of the second number of second-data operand subwords, wherein the interim result achieved for each one subword of the first number of first-data-operand-subwords is summed to achieve a final result stored in a corresponding partition of the destination operand.