How to Schedule LED Shows Automatically: LED Player Time Control Guide

Swapping SD cards by hand every holiday isn't maintenance — it's a tax on your time

Here's how to make LED shows run their own schedule.For property managers and system integration teams, the recurring chore of updating LED content is an easily underestimated operational drain. A building lights up for Christmas, and someone has to physically climb to the controller, pull the SD card, upload new effect files, and plug it back in for New Year. National day, a retail promotion, a weekend mode — each one is another site visit. Multiply that across a portfolio of buildings and the labor quietly dwarfs the original install.

The deeper problem: lighting that can't change on its own forces a person to be on site, often after hours, just to flip a program. That's not scalable, and it's not how modern LED automation should run.

What Is LED Player Time Control?

Time Control in Seekway Innovations' LED Player software is a powerful feature designed to play specific lighting effects at pre-set times automatically. You build a schedule once, and the controller handles program switching by date and time without anyone on site.

It is conveniently located under Property settings → Program Properties → Time Control. Think of it as a calendar for your lighting: each entry says "on this date, play this program."

It works for both the online controllers (the E208 slave controller and M280 master controller over Ethernet) and the offline SD-card controllers (S608, S808). Note: the pure offline S208 controller does not support Time Control, so it is out of scope. It is both a holiday lighting schedule and everyday lighting timing control in one tool.

Seekway S808 LED controller

How Time Control Works

Open the Time Control window and you manage a list of scheduled slots for LED scheduled playback:

• Add / Delete / Move / Copy— shape the list however your calendar needs it.

• State— enable or disable an individual list without deleting it.

• + Add— drop in a new time entry.

• Date— set the time, with options for year, month, day, and festival, so seasonal events are first-class, not hand-typed.

• Program— pick the program to broadcast at that time. You can select all, invert, or clear in one action.

• Confirm— save the setup.

Once the list is built and program timing control is enabled, the controller plays from the time-control list only. You set it up on the PC, confirm, and walk away.

Online vs Offline Deployment

This is where Time Control earns its keep across controller types:

For online systems, the schedule executes straight from the network. For offline timing controllers, you merge the SD.BIN and copy it into the SD card; the controller then follows the calendar on its own. Either way, the effect file still travels by SD card for offline units.

Priority and Capacity Limits

Two rules keep large schedules predictable:

• Priority Follows Program Ranking: The sequence of your programs determines the time-control priority. Higher ranking means higher priority when time slots overlap. (Tip: Always rank one-off festivals above your everyday loop, or your Christmas show might lose to the default program).

• Generous Capacity: An SD-card timing controller supports up to 100 time-control lists, with each list accommodating up to 10 effect types. This is more than enough to cover a full year of holidays alongside daily and weekly loops.

Scenarios That Pay Off

• Holiday calendars— Christmas, New Year, national days: one schedule, zero return visits.

• Business hours vs. off-hours— bright promo by day, calm ambient by night, via an auto switch program by calendar.

• City facades across districts— every building on the same calendar, managed from one console via the M280 master controller.

• Retail promotions— weekend and sale modes triggered on schedule, not by a late-night runner.

Get Started in 5 Steps

• In LED Player, open Time Control.

• Click + Addand set the Date (year / month / day / festival).

• In Program, choose what plays — use select all / invert / clear to move fast.

• Set Stateto enabled, then Confirm.

• Online: run the time-control list. Offline: merge BINand copy to the SD card.

Mistakes to Avoid

• Forgetting to enable the list: A saved list that stays disabled does nothing — flip State.

• Skipping the SD.BIN merge for offline units: Offline timing controllers need the merged file copied to the SD card; the schedule won't run from the PC alone.

• Ignoring program ranking: Overlapping slots resolve by ranking, so rank your headline events above the default loop.

• Assuming brightness timing works offline: Per the manual, brightness timing setup applies to online control items only — keep that separate from program scheduling.

FAQ

Q1: Does Time Control need a PC running on site?
No. Online systems run the list from the network; offline SD-card controllers run it from the SD card after you copy the merged SD.BIN.

Q2: How many scheduled slots can I have?
Up to 100 time-control lists on an SD-card timing controller, with 10 effect types per list.

Q3: Can I schedule by festival name?
Yes. The Date field offers year, month, day and festival options, so seasonal events are easy to place.

Q4: What if two schedules overlap?
The higher-ranked program wins — program ranking sets the time-control priority.

Q5: Which controllers support this?
The E208 and M280 online controllers, and the S608 and S808 offline SD-card controllers (the pure offline S208 does not support Time Control), all via LED Player from Seekway Innovations.

Contact Seekway Innovations

Want to upgrade your lighting automation? Contact Seekway Innovations today to find the right controller solution for your project.