Special purpose and general purpose processors

A data processing system includes data processing apparatuses formed with VUPU architecture by combining a general-purpose data processing unit (2) and a special-purpose data processing unit (1) equipped with a data path unit (20) for specialized data processing that is executed according to special-purpose instructions, and equipping the general-purpose data processing unit (2) with a communication function unit (12) for communicating with the general-purpose data processing unit (2) in another data processing apparatus. The data processing apparatuses are combined to form a system with a plurality of specialized circuits. Therefore, a data processing system in which parallel processing is performed by a plurality of specialized circuits can be provided economically and in a short time. An address range determines to which apparatus data should be transmitted. Arbitration means may be used to control access to data memory areas.