$digest and $real_password don't match and they should.

3) shows the password from the form, the script generated digest ($digest), the digest read from the config ($real_password) and the salt read from the config.

2) shows I'm, using using the same password and salt when I generate the digest for the config file on the command line.

As far as I can see the second and third fields of 3) should match and they don't... thats the problem :)