Xiaomi today launched the Mi 5c with its own Surge S1 chipset. The company’s first mobile chipset went from being under development to production in just 28 months. An octa-core chip, the Surge S1 packs four Cortex-A53 cores clocked at 2.2GHz and four A53 cores clocked at 1.4GHz.

Balancing power and performance, the Surge S1 features a quad-core Mali-T860 quad-core GPU that is up to 40 percent more power efficient than the previous generation Mali-T760 GPU and supports the latest Vulkan API standard. The chipset also features a 32-bit high performance DSP for better noise cancellation and voice processing. The baseband can also be upgraded via OTA so Xiaomi can add new voice related features to the chipset down the line.

Then, there is also the 14-bit dual ISP that helps increase sensitivity to light by over 50% and reduce noise in photos using its dual noise reduction algorithm. For enhanced security, the Surge S1 features chip-level security with TEE architecture and has strict compliance with safety regulations. The benchmarks shared by Xiaomi during the unveiling of the Mi 5c suggest that the Surge S1 chipset is over 2x faster than Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 625 chipset and other similar offerings from MediaTek in the GPU department, with the CPU benchmarks also showing the chipset enjoying a healthy lead over its competition.

As for the Mi 5c itself, it comes with a full metal body and a 5.15-inch Full HD display with up to 550nits of brightness. Other specs of the Mi 5c include 3GB RAM, 64GB storage, and 12MP rear camera with 1.25um pixels. The 132g heavy handset also features a 2860mAh battery with 9V/2A fast charging technology.

Xiaomi notes that one of the benefits of having its own chipset is that it will be able to quickly roll out software updates to the Mi 5c. The handset will be getting the Android 7.1.1 update in March, with a developer MIUI ROM being available when the handset is launched. For now, Xiaomi will only be launching the Mi 5c in China with no word on its international availability.