display sleep - can't turn off password request afterward

Thanks for the reply.

I've been trying to determine if a certain amount of time has to pass before it will require a password. I'm still not sure. I need to check further but, if I'm recalling accurately, sometimes a password is required after say a couple of minutes of display sleep while other much longer periods of display sleep do not require a password.

I did try your two suggestions but with the random nature of things it makes it a little difficult to come to solid conclusions. My brief time in Safe Mode did not result in a password request but I did not stay there long as something didn't seem right - changing from one desktop screen to another resulted in noticeable screen tearing, for example.

Two things I have noticed that are interesting:

1. Overnight I put my mac to sleep, that is the computer itself and not just the display (I use option+command+eject). In the morning I do NOT need to enter a password.
2. If on the preference screen shown in my original post I require a password after 8 hours, then I am no longer asked for a password after display sleep. Note that during the day I am rarely away from my mac for more than an hour and I'm currently not sure if it will indeed ask for a password after 8 hours. Importantly, with it set to 8 hours, I am no longer getting a password request after short display sleeps.

I've being doing some more testing and keeping a log of the results. With the settings as shown in my original post, I am getting random behavior. For example, a password was required after 18 minutes of display sleep and another time after 1 hour 26 minutes and yet a password was not required after 12 minutes or another time after 2 hours 30 minutes.

What could be the cause of this?

I also tried Safe Mode again but my mac is very slow in that mode and too much of what I need does not work and hence I don't think I will be using that for further testing unless someone has a particular idea to test out. Similarly working from an alternate account is not practical (I work all day from my mac).

This is getting even more annoying. I just got a password request after about 5 or so seconds and this is despite the setting currently been set to 8 hours :(