Parallels has launched Parallels Toolbox 3.5 for macOS and Windows, an update of its suite of 30-plus tools designed to simplify everyday tasks. According to ick Dobrovolskiy, Parallels senior vice president of Engineering and Support, new tools for macOS include:
Clipboard History: Captures what’s copied to the Mac clipboard, including plain and formatted text. It also offers full text search, favorites and settings to collect content for up to 30 days. You can also pause the collection or exclude applications, allowing users to further customize the tool.
Hide Menu Icons: Allows users to hide some icons from the Mac menu bar by creating two sets of menu-bar icons, visible and invisible. Less important icons only become visible when the user clicks the tool’s control in the Mac menu bar. Hidden icons automatically hide when the user goes back to working with applications from the control menu.
Energy Saver: Activates several settings, including hidden ones that reduce system-resources usage and increase battery life, saving up to eight percent in power consumption. It automatically detects your computer’s state when it’s running on battery and activates options for users to enable or disable.
Sleep Timer: Allows you to set a timer for the computer to either go to sleep or shut down from the moment you press “Start,” helping you save energy. Time options range from 15 minutes to six hours.
Clean Drive: Users can now see files that will be deleted, with the ability to find them in Finder for improved transparency.
Find Duplicates: Ability to mass-select multiple duplicates for better total-size representation and simplified sorting options.
Dobrovolskiy adds that productivity tools in Parallels Toolbox for Mac and Windows 3.5 also include:
Streamlined Screen Video/Audio Recording, Downloading and Conversion. Change tool default settings to simply record video with your desired audio source or to capture screenshots in the format you need—with just one click.
Convert Video: Drag almost any video onto the tool (such as your favorite movie or TV show) to convert it to MP4 so it can be played on tablets and phones.
Take Photo: Instantly take photos using the PC’s or Mac camera. The image file immediately appears at your pre-selected destination, such as the desktop or a folder.
Resize Images: Batch convert images to your desired file size and format. Simply drag the source images to the tool’s window, select the desired output format (HEIF, JPEG, TIFF or PNG) as well as dimensions/size and output location, and then click.
Capture Screen: Click anywhere to take a screenshot of the entire screen and automatically save the image in a variety of formats (PNG, JPEG, TIFF and GIF) to your desktop or pre-selected folder.
Hide Desktop: Instantly hide distracting desktop files instead of removing each one manually. One click hides files, folders and icons on your desktop for clutter-free presentations.
Do Not Disturb: Don’t waste time changing settings in each running application. One click disables notifications and Dock animations that could interrupt your work or presentation.
Do Not Sleep: Prevent disruptions and inconvenient logouts—with just one click, disable all system settings that cause the computer to sleep.
Launch: Opening multiple applications and files for a project is now fast and simple. With one click, open several items at once—such as applications, documents, folders, links or other files. Simply drag the files to the tool’s window to create a sequence of items that automatically open the next time you click the tool’s icon.
Archive: Easily create compressed and password-protected archives of your files from various locations to save space or share them. Just drag files and folders to this tool window—there’s no need to move or copy files to a single folder.
Unarchive: Quickly unpack archives of various file compression formats—such as RAR, RPM, XAR and Z—including those not supported by the built-in system utility. Double-clicking these files opens unarchive and starts unpacking, even password-protected archives.
Uninstall Apps: Easily remove applications and their files with a single click for faster removals.
Demos of Parallels Toolbox 3.5 for macOS and Windows and Mac are available \as standalone products at parallels.com/toolbox. Each product can be purchased for $19.99 per year. Each annual license includes free updates of new and enhanced tools as they become available.
