Digital signal processing method and system employing separate program

Abstract

A digital signal processing system for executing instructions and processing data, including a program memory which stores the instructions and a first portion of the data, a data memory which stores a second portion of the data, and a program control unit connected to the program memory for receiving a sequence of the instructions and generating control signals for executing the instructions, wherein the program control unit is programmed to fetch at least one data value from the program memory in response to at least one of the instructions. Preferably, the system also includes a memory management unit connected to the program control unit and the data memory for generating address signals in response to at least one of the control signals for use in reading data values from the data memory. In preferred embodiments of the method of the invention, a digital signal processor (having a program memory which stores instructions and data and a physically separate data memory which stores data) generates control bits for controlling a read of data from the data memory in response to a first instruction from the program memory, and fetches data from the program memory in response to a second instruction from the program memory.