IMac Refusing to Sleep

I'm not sure why, but my Mac seems to be having 'sleeping' troubles lately. I have set my display to turn off after 1 minute of inactivity, and for the Mac to sleep after 15 mins.
But the vast majority of the time, my display does not even turn off.
Every now and then, my display will turn off, but then it will turn straight back on again. Bear in mind that at this point the password screen shows up, as that is how my system preferences are set.
Then the password screen just stays on, the display does not turn off and the system doesn't sleep after 15 minutes.
It's as if something is constantly 'waking up' my Mac, but I've tried turning off my mouse and disconnecting my keyboard yet the problem persists.
If I put my Mac to sleep myself then it just turns itself back on, most of the time it just starts back up as soon as it's been put to sleep.
This has been going on for a few days now, I've tried zapping my PRAM and even carried out all of the automation maintenance tasks in Onyx.
I am completely out of ideas! Does anyone have any ideas of how to fix it? Otherwise my Mac will just be on constantly unless I shut it down.

Thanks for the tips, hadn't noticed that article on the Apple site (although I did read a different one about why your Mac may not sleep!)
For some reason it seems to be working fine again, and I haven't even done anything! Coincidentally it was as soon as I posted the message on this forum that it returned to normal.
I'm not sure how as I didn't really have any apps open.
I have, however, been uploading about 15GB to my Dropbox account since yesterday, maybe that had something to do with it? It's still uploading now though, despite the sleep problem having gone away.
Hopefully that's the last of it anyway, if it returns I'll check my log files
Thanks.

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Here's more on sleep;
This is for a Mac that won't sleep.
Here is KB article HT1776 with their tips.
Mine follow;
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"I have had this problem with my IMac G5. It is surprisingly irritating. LaCie's Silverkeeper backup software was the cause. By default it gave itself permission to wake up the computer to check if a backup was needed. Do you have this or a similar program installed which has scheduled activities including wake-up permissions as an option?"
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After unchecking "Change picture..." in system preferences (under Desktop/Screen saver), my powerbook went to sleep all by itself.
Tristan Currier noticed this; "I have a Canon printer(shared) and my imac would not sleep. I opened up printer/fax in system prefs and noticed it said the printer was in use when it was off. Opened up the printer queue and noticed about 7 pending documents. Deleted them all and now it sleeps.
Check the printer queue!"
Good Luck!  DALE

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==================
Repairing permissions from the Tiger DVD
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You may want to mark this thread with a correct answer which you will find in the Legend to the right. This may help other people with a similar issue.

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Please reply to all questions.

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http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=11194586&#11194586
Regards.

Late 2009 MBP Refuses to Sleep.

Hello,
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InchoSnail,
Some links to check, maybe there may be something for you, if you have not already seen these.
Mac OS X: Why your Mac might not sleep or stay in sleep mode
OS X Mavericks: If your Mac won’t go to or stay in sleep
OS X: When your Mac doesn't sleep or wake

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Sometimes there are problems.
Somethings to try but probably won't help....
1. Repair Disk Permissions
2. Startup in Safe mode by holding down the "Shift" key....
3. Reset the P Ram by holding down the "Command/Option/P/R" keys at the same time...
The above are standard items to do on any Mac from time to time.
I repair permissions at least once a month....
The other 2 periodically as they do straighten things out when they get out of whack....
Thanks for the feedback.

IMac Refusing to Sleep

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