Apple's iMac Shortage Reportedly Fixed

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- One of the major blemishes in Apple's (AAPL) first-quarter earnings was the sharp decline in Mac sales, falling more than 1 million year over year. That problem could be fixed, as the new iMac shortage reportedly has been solved.

Brightwire, via the China Times, is reporting that the iMac, which has been capacity-constrained since it was launched in November has now been fixed, and that mass production is now in full capacity.

Some of Apple's Taiwanese component suppliers noted that assembling the iMac, which is notoriously very difficult because of its sleek, thin look, has been improved and sales should be strong in the first quarter of 2013.

Apple CEO Tim Cook explained the Mac shortfall in a conference call to analysts on Wednesday, saying a lot of was due to iMac constraints, which were down 700,000 units year over year.

"And so there were limited weeks of ramping on these products during the quarter, we left the quarter with significant constraints on the iMac," Cook said. "And we believe we know that our sales would have been materially higher if those constraints would not have existed."

The 21.5-inch version of the iMac started shipping in November, while the 27-inch version started shipping in mid-December. A look on Apple's Web site still shows delays for the new desktop computer. The 21.5-inch version shows a ship time of thwo to three weeks, while the 27-inch will ship in three weeks to four weeks.

Apple shares were off 1.09% to $445.58 in trading Friday..

--Written by Chris Ciaccia in New York

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