3

I recently got a new laptop (Lenovo T440p with Windows 8.1 Pro) and was having the following issue: the screen would lock (screen would go black and require a password to get back in) after 1 minute. I would prefer something more like 10 or 15 minutes. So, I tried the obvious changes (check the screensaver settings, power management settings for sleep, turning off the screen, etc.), with no success. I did, however, notice a rather odd behavior: if I changed the screensaver timeout from 1 minute to anything else (say, 15 mins), clicked OK, and re-opened the screensaver settings window, it would be back to 1 minute. Odd.

At that point, I turned to Google. I found posts (this one in particular was helpful) suggesting all sorts of causes and resolutions:

  • If you have Cisco AnyConnect VPN client (which I did), try uninstalling it. I uninstalled, rebooted, no change.
  • Open the User Accounts control panel and, on the left side of the screen, click Reset Security Policies. My User Accounts control panel, however, has no such link.
  • Reboot into a repair console and run "sfc /scannow". It did indeed find and repair some issues, but didn't fix the screen timeout problem.
  • Edit the Group Policy to force a particular timeout time; the setting showed up correctly (15 mins) in screensaver settings, power management settings, etc., but the screen would still go black and lock after 1 minute.
  • In the registry, manually change the screensaver timeout and the "turn off the screen" timeout. No luck.
Improve this question
0

5 Answers 5

Reset to default
2

In the end, I had to dig through the output from Process Monitor to see what other settings might be getting set (by who-knows-what) when I changed my screensaver settings. I found a registry key I haven't seen before: 

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System\InactivityTimeoutSecs

It was set to 60 (seconds). I updated it to 900 (15 minutes), and it worked!

I still don't know how that got set in the first place, or why my screensaver timeout kept reverting to 1 minute (it doesn't anymore, since I changed that registry key), but if you have any ideas to help explain it, I'm all ears (or eyes, I suppose). Still, since this caused me so much time and frustration, I wanted to post what finally worked in case it can help someone else.

Improve this answer
1

i had this issue also, it turned out it was getting the mobile device settings from exchange and locking like a phone would. tested it out by editing the exchange setting and that was it. turns out i must have miss-clicked on windows mail and setup my email account and it started pulling these settings.

Improve this answer
0

This worked for me:

Start/Search and type gpedit.msc, Right click the gpedit results and Run As Administrator. In the Elevated Group Policy Editor, on the Left Panel, go to User Configuration/Administrative Templates/Control Panel/Personalization/Enable Screen Saver and enable the Policy.
Once you have enabled that policy, go down and also enable Screen Saver Timeout. Note that in the Screen Saver Timeout policy there's an option to set the number of second for the timeout with the default being 900 seconds or 15 minutes.

Once you've enabled both policies and set the timeout if different from the default, exit the group policy editor. If you now go the screen saver settings in Control Panel you will notice that the wait period will match the minutes you entered in the group policy editor but it will be grayed out preventing you from changing the value unless you go back into the group policy editor and change it there.

Improve this answer
0

I had this same problem with Windows 10. In the end I found a solution which is easier than going into regedit. From the Windows Start button go into 'Settings' and type "Screen saver" in the 'Find a setting' box at top right of the screen. On the new screen click 'Change screen saver'. Then minimise the page, and you should find a 'Screen saver settings' page hidden underneath it. In my case this was set to 1 minute, and resetting it to 15 minutes solved the problem.

Improve this answer
-2

Just Go through Link this help me:

https://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-T400-T500-and-newer-T/Machine-always-goes-into-standby-mode-after-1-min-of-being-idle/ta-p/414093

Improve this answer
1
  • 1
    Link-only answers are not helpful. Please edit your answer, and include all relevant information, be sure to quote and cite any sources you might use for that information.
    – Ramhound
    Commented Jun 30, 2017 at 19:26

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .