Limited Thunderbolt Display Availability Sparks Hope of a WWDC Refresh

Stock of Apple's Thunderbolt Display is limited or unavailable at some Apple Stores in North America, Europe, Australia and other regions ahead of WWDC, reports MacRumors.

A spot check of Apple Stores in the U.S., for example, reveals that the Thunderbolt Display is available on a ship-to-store basis only at all or select locations in Albany, Buffalo, Columbus, Detroit, Indianapolis, Memphis, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Raleigh, San Antonio, San Diego, Syracuse, and many other mid-sized cities and their surrounding areas.

A reliable source told the site that in London and the surrounding area, the Thunderbolt Display has been out of stock for a month. A tipster also claims that the 27-inch monitor was pulled from sale, with stock "returned to warehouse" at a U.K. store. A similar tip was received from Australia. Despite this, stock does remain in some major cities including Chicago, L.A., Miami, New York, and San Francisco.


The Thunderbolt Display is nearly five years old and many have been hoping that Apple will replace it with a 5K (5120x2880) display, the same one used for its 27-inch iMac. Only the late 2013 Mac Pro, late 2014 or newer 27" Retina 5K iMac, and mid 2015 15-inch MacBook Pro with AMD Radeon R9 M370X graphics are capable of driving 5K external displays using two Thunderbolt cables per display. Unfortunately, Skylake and Kaby Lake processors will not support DisplayPort 1.3 which has support for 5K displays over one cable.

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