Setting 1: Enable Screen Saver
Then on the right, double click Enable Screen Saver. In the window that opens, select “Enabled” and click OK.
Setting 2: Screen Saver Timeout
Now in the right pane of the local group policy editor, double click Screen saver timeout. Select “Enabled” and set the setting showing “Number of seconds to enable the screen saver” to the number of seconds of inactivity after which you want the screen to lock. For instance, for 15 minutes set it to 900, or for 10 minutes, set it to 600. Click OK.
Setting 3: Force Specific Screen Saver
Now, in the right pane, double click Force specific screen saver. Here you need to specify the name of the screen saver to be used. There is no default here, and so if this settings is not configured, the screen lock will not take place.
To find the name of available screen saver programs, open File Explorer and browse to folder “C:\Windows\System32” (the path may be different if your Windows installation uses another drive instead of C-drive). Here, click on Type just above the list of files/folders. This sorts the files by file-type, so that all files of a type appear together. Scroll down until you see files of type “.scr” (Screen Saver). Note one of the file names of type screen saver, such as “scrnsave” or “Bubbles.”
Now we need to type the complete path along with the extension “.scr” in the “Force Specific screen saver” settings window. The complete path to be entered is “C:\Windows\System32\scrnsave.scr” if we want to use “scrnsave” as our specific screen saver. This is the “blank screen” screen saver.
Click OK to close this setting window.
Setting 4: Password Protect the Screen Saver
The above settings just cause the screen saver to kick in. To require the user to provide a password when they return after the screen saver started, we need to configure this fourth setting.
In the right pane, double click Password protects the screen saver.
In the window that opens, select “Enabled” and click OK.
Your changes will take effect after you restart the computer.
