User login on iMac with High Sierra

21 Nov 2017 18:30:07

Georgia Cheer

Hi All,
I was in FL with my parents and walked in to see my Dad downloading the High Sierra OS on his iMac. Okay, I wasn't happy. As I knew it would mean changes and questions for him and me. Yep, I'm still on 10.12.6) Anyway, he used to be able to log in to his iMac without using a password. NOW, since he downloaded High Sierra, it boots up with 3 users: Admin, Sam Cheer and Guest. He then selects the middle one, Sam Cheer, the screen revolves to just show Sam Cheer icon with the box to enter his password. HE doesn't like that. He didn't have to enter a password before and wants to just click on his name and the screen then lets him enter. How do I make this happen for Dad again so he won't have to keep entering his password please? He leaves his computer on all the time so it goes to sleep mode. Then when he wants to use it, he wakes it up and wants to just start using it. Thanks for your help.

Re: User login on iMac with High Sierra

22 Nov 2017 10:04:41

Drew McFarlane

System Preferences > Security & Privacy.

I believe you can make changes to password settings from there.

Re: User login on iMac with High Sierra

22 Nov 2017 12:40:56

Tony Still

This shouldn't have changed from Sierra but you can change back to the behaviour you want as long as FileVault (disk encryption) is not turned on.

Go to System Preferences > Users & Groups, click on Login Options at the bottom of the left hand pane and you'll find an Automatic login control at the top on the right. I quote Help for the rest of what's needed:

To automatically log in a particular user when the Mac restarts, choose the user’s account name and enter the user’s password. This option is useful if the Mac has only one user and is always in a secure location. If security is a concern, automatic login should be off.

Re: User login on iMac with High Sierra

23 Nov 2017 09:36:52

Euan Williams

Your Dad may be finding that his iMac 'locks' after it has been asleep or displaying the screen saver for a while, and he (might) confuse this with some sort of restart situation. If so, as Drew hinted, you can reset this behaviour easily by going to:
System Preferences >Security and Privacy > General > 'Require Password xxxx after Sleep or Screen Saver begins'.
Untick the box (you may need to type his Admin password).

Re: User login on iMac with High Sierra

11 Dec 2017 10:33:49

Georgia Cheer

Thank you to all for your suggestions. I think he has managed to solve it with the help provided here.