Patent ID: 7206920

Claim:
A method of verifying if an initial extrema value is valid as one of a maximum and a minimum, comprising: loading the initial extrema value into N elements of a first register, wherein N>1; comparing the initial extrema value in the elements of the first register with contents of a first set of N elements of a data storage; loading, into N elements of a second register, the extremae of the contents in the N elements of the data storage and the initial extrema value in the elements of the first register; determining if the initial extrema value is valid based on contents of the N elements of the second register; and in response to determining that the initial extrema value is valid, comparing the initial extrema value with contents of a second set of elements of the data storage and loading, into the N elements of the second register, the extremae of the contents in the N elements of the data storage and the initial extrema value in the elements of the first register.