HTC has officially announced a new version of the HTC One M9, initially for the Chinese and Asian markets, that has a high resolution 2560 x 1440 5.2-inch screen but more importantly swaps a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor for a MediaTek one.

In fact, the HTC One ME (originally called ME9) is the first phone to sport the 64-bit octa-core 2.2GHz MediaTek Helio X10 and as such is expected to move like the clappers.

Other specifications include dual SIM capabilities, a 20-megapixel rear camera, HTC Ultrapixel front camera, and 3GB of RAM.

It is bigger than the conventional HTC One M9 to fit the extra 0.2-inches of screen real estate, measuring 151 x 72 x 9.75mm. But it's actually fractionally lighter.

READ: HTC One M9 review: Distracted by refinement

The One ME has NFC, Bluetooth 4.1 and the other raft of usual wireless and wired connections, plus a microSDXC card slot that can accept a card up to a whopping 2TB in size. There's 32GB of internal storage.

Whether the HTC One ME ever makes it to the UK, US or other regions outside Asia is currently not known. Its Chinese price is also yet to be announced, but we do know that it will be available in three different colours: gray, gold and rose gold.