The control panel hasn't changed.

One thing that alot of distros seem to be adding are their own control panels, separate of the main one. This is not a good idea, since it means that to find certain settings you need to jump back and forth between different control panels.

One of the useful packages PCLinuxOS contains by default is the VideoLAN Client, or VLC.

Of course PCLinuxOS still uses the Synaptic package manager.

Shutting down PCLinuxOS.