Parallels Desktop - 15.0 Getting Started

About Parallels Desktop 15

Parallels Desktop® 15 for Mac is the simplest, most powerful solution for running Windows and
Windows applications on Mac® without rebooting. For more information, see the Parallels
Desktop 15 for Mac documentation.

What's New in Version 15

Graphics

Graphics in Parallels Desktop 15 have been significantly improved compared to previous
product versions.

• With the help of Apple Metal, Parallels introduces support for DirectX 11. Now you can
run Autodesk 3ds Max 2020, Lumion, ArcGIS Pro 2.3, products from MasterSeries and
more. You can also play many favorite games, including Madden NFL 19, Age of
Empires: Definitive Edition, Anno 2205, Railway Empire, Space Engineers, Frostpunk,
Risk of Rain 2 and many more.

• DirectX 3D graphics are now accelerated by the Apple Metal engine.

• Enhanced compatibility with new Linux distributions due to Virtio GPU that supports
sliding mouse (when Parallels Desktop captures the guest OS mouse cursor), dynamic
resolution (when the screen resolution changes dynamically if you resize the virtual
machine window) and multimonitor support—even without Parallels Tools.

• Support for DRM-based graphics required by recent versions of major Linux
distributions.

Performance

Despite continuous performance improvements every year and almost native performance in
many scenarios, we managed to make the product even faster and efficient.

• Some applications can use DirectX 11 and thus are much faster, compared to being
unusably slow in previous versions.

• 3D graphics are up to 15% faster.

• Microsoft Office applications are up to 80% faster.

• User interface is more responsive.

Getting ready for macOS 10.15 Catalina

• Get even more graphics power with the release of macOS® 10.15 Catalina. Play more
DirectX 11 games including FIFA 19, Fallout 4, Elite Dangerous, Prey (2017), Crysis 3,

Anno 1800 and more.

• Improved support for Apple Pencil® drawing capabilities when you work with Windows
applications on iPad® using Sidecar:

Tilt support for Apple Pencil.

Double-tap Apple Pencil to get new Touch Bar options:

- Toggle between Pen, Eraser and Mouse modes.

- Easily take a snip, enable Windows Tablet mode or open the Windows onscreen
keyboard from Touch Bar.

Hardware

• Support for non-volatile memory express (NVMe) disk controller—the next generation of
storage controllers. NVMe is more virtualization friendly and effective than AHCI. NVMe
leverages not just solid-state storage but also modern multicore CPUs.

• Support for Intel HDA audio card:

- Supports up to 8/2 channels (out/in), 192kHz sample rate and 32-bit samples.

- Improved sound quality of VoIP phones.

- Support for “jack sense.”

- Automatic detection when the microphone is muted. If access to the Mac®
microphone is not allowed by the user or macOS preferences, Windows
shows the microphone as muted.

- Automatic detection when sound output is disabled. If it is disabled in the
virtual machine settings, Windows also shows sound output as disabled.

• Support for Bluetooth Low Energy. This allows you to use more devices, including
Logitech Craft, IrisPEN and some IoT devices (such as smart home appliances and
smart bands).

Version of the Bluetooth driver is 4.0.

Convenience

• Boot Camp–based virtual machine improvements:

- Windows became more stable on startup.

- Resolved the issue with Boot Camp–based virtual machines becoming broken due to
hard disk reconfiguration.

- Improved support for major Windows updates. When Windows installs a major update
in a virtual machine, Parallels Desktop offers to complete update installation in Boot

Camp natively.

- New Boot Camp icon is used instead of the Windows 10 icon for Boot Camp–based
virtual machines.

• When reverting to a snapshot, Parallels Desktop offers to save current VM state as a
new snapshot.

• Though dragging and dropping images has been supported from the very beginning,
some of the latest macOS screenshots cannot be simply dragged to Windows because
of the new format. We have enhanced drag-and-drop functionality—now you can drag
screenshot previews, images from Safari, Photos and other macOS applications and
drop them to your Windows applications.

• Completely redesigned keyboard layouts support improving several aspects, including:

- Excel shortcuts “Ctrl” + “+” and “Ctrl” + “-“ are now supported.

- Improved support for JIS keyboard.

- Fixed input with CAPS LOCK on for most of non-English layouts.

• Now you can send files from macOS as attachments using the default email application
in Windows. Right-click a macOS file, point to Share > More > Send with Windows
Email App.

The default email application can be changed in Windows settings.

• Improved USB automatic connection. Prior to Parallels Desktop 15, when a USB device
connected to a virtual machine for a repeated time, Windows might treat this device as
new and initiate driver installation. Now Parallels Desktop stores history for USB devices
and connects a device to the same USB port every time, so users are not bothered with
driver installation on repeated device connection.

• Parallels Desktop saves your Parallels account credentials to Mac Keychain. Next time
you need to sign in, your account credentials will be autofilled from Keychain.

• Similar to the CD/DVD icon in the virtual machine title bar, other devices like camera,
microphone and speakers now have indication when they are disabled.

• Upgrade to Windows 10 Adviser. In January 2020, Windows 7 will reach the end of
extended support (no more security patches). A new menu item for Windows 7 users
opens an assistant with the details on how to upgrade to Windows 10.

• New Parallels Desktop users might have issues understanding Coherence mode. We
have created a dialog that appears with animation to explain how a virtual machine
works in this view mode.

• Installing Windows updates is a resource-consuming operation. To improve the user
experience with the product, new Windows 10 virtual machines will have Windows
Updates paused for 7 days.

If required, you can resume updates in Windows settings.

• If a user updates or upgrades Parallels Desktop manually while a previous version is