14 DAY TRIAL // For those of us who have a great amount of applications starting at login, that minute lost while waiting for the computer to start up is a waste of time. As the old saying goes: "Time is money!". Therefore, any software utility that can save us time is very welcomed. This is exactly the reason why I tried Power Manager, a software tool developed by Dragon Systems Software Limited.
Power Manager is an easy to use start up / shutdown timer that also includes some other functions, such as: Wake, Sleep, Login Window, Log Out and Restart. Basically, you can make your computer do anything you want, when you want it. Power Manager installs on your Mac as a preference panel that you can configure through the System Preferences window.
You can create multiple schedules, setting your computer to perform the selected action at a specific time. When you create an event, you can set it to take place just once, at the chosen time, or make it happen daily. For the latter option, you have the possibility to trigger the event on every weekday, on each weekend day, on a specified day of the week or you can easily create your custom day selection. For example, you can set your computer to shutdown at 8:00 PM every Monday, Tuesday and Friday.
Power Manager is fully customizable, easily adjusting to the user's needs. It's a pleasure indeed not having to wait for my Mac to start all my applications at login. With Power Manager, my Mac is already running when I get to work. Also, if you usually forget to shut down your computer at the end of the day, you can easily set Power Manager to do that for you.
Power Manager also provides an assistant that gives you instructions on how to set up a schedule and guides you all the way through. The first step is choosing the desired life style, you have to choose from 5 types of activity the one that best suites your computer. For your home Mac, the wizard lets you create 3 different events: 'Before Work or School', 'After Work or School' and 'Weekends'; on the other hand, if you select an office schedule, the preset events are: 'Working Hours', 'Lunch', 'Rest Break' and 'Weekly Meeting'. As you can see, the developers of Power Manager seem to have thought of everything.
If you choose not to take advantage of the assistant and want to create your own events, Power Manager is just as easy to configure. Press the 'Add' button from the preference pane and all you have to do next is fill in the form. First, you need to specify a name for your event, then select the desired action and the repeating mode. For some of the possible actions (actually, for all except the 'Start Up or Wake' and 'Wake') there's also another triggering method: 'After inactivity'. The event with this type of trigger will take place when the user is inactive for a period of time. You can, of course, select that period from a time interval ranging from 2 to 180 minutes.
You can also set Power Manager to show your current schedule in the menu bar. You will see an icon representing the next event that is going to be triggered. Clicking the icon brings down a menu containing all the active events in your schedule.
The Good
Power Manager is easy to configure, intuitive and does everything you expect it to do, and very well I might say. The best thing about Power Manager is that you only have to configure it once and then you can forget about it. Create the appropriate schedule for your needs and Power Manager will start up and shut down your Mac exactly when you want it to.
The Bad
When it comes to things I didn't like about Power Manager, I can't find anything to say. Except maybe for the fact that its price seems a little bit high to me, $28.95 being the price of a personal license.
The Truth
If you want to wake up your computer at a specified time in the morning, or shut it down when you leave your work or maybe go to sleep, you can be sure that Power Manager will do it sticking to your configured schedule. In the 30-day trial period you have enough time to evaluate its behavior and features and decide whether Power Manager is worth the money you are asked to pay for it.
All in all, Power Manager is a great tool that can adapt to every user's needs.
Here are some snapshots of the application in action:
