Apple has quietly delayed mass availability of its premium desktop again. At present the company offers to pre-order the new Mac Pro and get it in five or six weeks from now, sometimes in May. It looks like more than four months after the official launch date, Apple still cannot fulfill demand for the new high-end workstation.

Initially, Apple intended to begin volume shipments of its Mac Pro in December, 2013. Some fortunate owners even got their innovative workstations back last year, but many were told to wait until February, 2014. At present, Apple’s online stores in the U.S. and the U.K. note that Mac Pro workstations that are pre-ordered today will only be dispatched in five or six weeks from now, which means sometimes in May, perhaps, even in the second half of next month.

Apple Mac Pro sports a state-of-the-art cylindrical design that consist of numerous unique/non-standard components. The latter need to be produced to order, which means that shortage of just one piece made specifically for the Mac Pro by a contract manufacturer could ruin shipments schedules for the desktop. Besides, the system is assembled in the U.S., where manufacturing capacities may be comparatively limited compared to the large fabs in China that make MacBook laptops.

Since Apple has not upgraded its Mac Pro for quite a while, the demand for the new Mac Pro can be very high as professionals want higher-performing systems. However, persisting shortages that have existed for months are still pretty shocking.

Shipments delays are pretty common in the industry and they are not really surprising with the new Mac Pro. What is surprising is that Apple, which is renowned for its one of the world’s best supply chains, cannot solve availability problems for about four months now.

KitGuru Says: Apple will report its second quarter result sometimes in late April. During the conference call its head Tim Cook will likely share the shipments numbers and will likely note the success of the Mac Pro, in case the system is actually in so high demand that Apple cannot fulfill it. If he does not, then the reasons behind Mac Pro delays and shortages will remain completely unknown.

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