They had to wait a little before knowing it was a flop.
First, they bet everything in their dual gpu strategy, but not many software developers jumped on that boat. They had to give them time to adapt to such architecture before knowing it was not going to work.
No. They just wanted to get rid of the Pro tower, and tried to turn it into an appliance, a la the Studio. The design was not borne of any insight into dual-GPU being the future. Two small GPUs simply helped distribute the heat on a chimney heatsink, enabling the compact cylinder design they'd fallen in love with to work.
Having tried to force a design on a Pro market that wasn't interested, they tried to wait them out, hoping their customers would just give up and buy it anyway. When it became apparent they were moving to Windows PCs instead, they panicked and held the 'mea culpa' event. Then started work the next day on a new Mac Pro, that despite implying to the access media was just around the corner, took a further 2.5+ years to come out.
Plus the US-based production line for the 6,1 was likely quite expensive. Given the low sales of the MP generally, Apple were probably loathe to just write it off after a couple of years. They probably seriously considered cancelling the whole product line instead.
Then they had to update the tcMP, which they couldn’t because the thermal envelope was so constrained because of the design, it was impossible to bring more powerful components inside.
A spectacular unforced error, based on taking their customers for granted, and putting the reduction of Apple's costs before the needs of their buyers. Plus post-Steve, trying too hard to show the world their assess could still 'innovate'.
After two or three years it was obvious the trashcan didn’t meet their goals, and it never will, so they had to think if they were going to release a new mac pro or end the line, and in the former case, start working on it. Both takes time, taking the decission and designing a new machine.
Yep. Though they could have released it much sooner had they just kept it simple and updated the cMP design. All that 'rethinking the Pro tower' deep dive was a waste of time, ultimately, given they discontinued the 7,1 after one generation, replacing it with a pale imitation that can't even take GPUs. The whole thing is a testament to ego and hubris; having to turn everything into a design statement, rather than just giving people practical tools in a timely fashion.
TL;DR, they didn’t wait 6 years to replace it, even though 6 years went by between both models.
This is splitting hairs. Obviously there's a lead time to manufacturing, but the bottom line is that after 6 years, the Mac Pro was horribly outdated - and over priced.
