How Advanced SimLive Actually Works

Most people visualize Advanced SimLive as a magic button: you schedule an event, pick an asset, and at the appointed time everything goes live across multiple platforms at once.

But when something does not behave the way you expected (the stream starts late, the social platform shows a gap, audio is offset), it really helps to know what is actually happening under the hood. This article walks you through every stage of an Advanced SimLive event, in order, so you can plan with confidence and troubleshoot quickly when things drift off course.

Picture an Advanced SimLive event like a commercial flight. You do not see the ground crew refueling, the gate agent boarding passengers, or the captain finishing pre-flight checks. You just see the plane push back from the gate at 8:00 AM. But every one of those steps had to happen on time — and in the right order — for that to work. Advance SimLive is the same. Here is the ground crew you do not see.

The full timeline at a glance

Phase	Time relative to event	What is happening
1. Scheduling	Hours or days before	You create the event and tag the MP4 asset or feed
2. Standby	T-30 minutes to T-5 minutes	Sardius queues your event in the broadcast scheduler
3. Pre-roll TIME (warm-up)	T-5 to T-3 minutes	Virtual encoder spins up
4. Verify Outputs	T-90 to T-0 Seconds	Pre-roll Bumper plays. Social RTMP paths are established all destinations handshake complete
5. Go live	T-0	Your main video starts to play
6. Main content	During the event	Your main video plays as 'live' across Player + social
7. End	Post-event	Stream closes

Each phase below is described in detail, so you can match a symptom ("my stream started 90 seconds late") to the phase that owns it ("that's a pre-roll TIME issue, not a content issue").

Phase 1 — Scheduling

Everything starts hours or days before air time. Inside the Sardius Control Panel, you:

Choose the asset you want to broadcast (must be an MP4 file for Advanced SimLive).
Set the scheduled start time (and time zone) for the event.
Pick destinations — Sardius Player plus any combination of Facebook Live, YouTube Live, or other RTMP-compatible social accounts.
Optionally tag the asset to a feed so the event is part of a recurring SimLive series.

At this point nothing is streaming yet. You have simply told Sardius: “at 8:00 AM Sunday, take this file and broadcast it everywhere on this list.”

Phase 2 — Standby

From the moment you schedule the event until roughly five minutes before air, the event sits in the broadcast scheduler in a quiet 'queued' state. The platform tracks it, sends any pre-event notifications you have configured, and prepares to fire.

Nothing user-visible happens during standby. This is the equivalent of the plane sitting at the gate with the doors open, waiting for the boarding window.

Phase 3 — Pre-Roll TIME (the virtual encoder spins up)

This is the phase that surprises most operators when they first see it. Roughly 3 to 5 minutes before your scheduled start time, the virtual encoder powers on. Think of the 'virtual encoder' as a piece of software that does the job a physical hardware encoder would do at a traditional broadcast: it takes the source file, transcodes it into the right format for each destination, and pushes the resulting streams out into the world.

During this window, several things happen in quick succession:

Compute resources are allocated and the encoder boots.
The MP4 bumper is loaded into the encoder, along with any post-roll or backup videos.
The MP4 asset is opened and validated (codec, container, duration).
HLS streams are prepared for the Sardius Player path.

None of this is visible to viewers. They see no content, no player activity, no countdown — because the event has not technically started yet. The system is just getting itself ready to start cleanly.

This is what we mean when we say 'pre-roll time': it is the time the system needs to warm up before the live event actually begins. (If you have not read the 'Understanding Pre-Roll' article yet, do that next — it explains why pre-roll TIME is not the same thing as a pre-roll BUMPER video.)

Phase 4 — Verify outputs

In the final 90 seconds before the scheduled start, the encoder enters a sync-and-verify phase. The system confirms:

an RTMP push connection for all outputs. Facebook gets one; YouTube gets one; any additional social outputs get their own.
All destination handshakes are complete and stable.
Audio and video alignment is correct.
The primary asset is ready to play from the first frame.
There are no error states that would prevent a clean start.

If any check fails, the platform attempts automatic recovery or surfaces an error in the Control Panel so your team can intervene before air.

NOTE: If your Advanced SimLive event does not utilize a pre-roll bumper, the virtual encoder will start playing your main content early in order to validate the streaming paths.

Phase 5 — Go live (T-0)

At exactly the scheduled start time, the platform begins playing your asset across every destination at the same moment. Viewers on the Sardius Player, Facebook Live, and YouTube Live all see the broadcast begin in sync.

If you have configured a pre-roll BUMPER at the top of your asset or playlist (a countdown, a welcome screen, a worship loop), this is the first thing viewers see. The bumper plays as part of the live broadcast — it is content, not configuration. After the bumper finishes, your main content begins seamlessly.

NOTE: If you did not load a pre-roll bumper, your main content will already be playing at T-0. The first 90 seconds will have already played and won’t be visible to your audience.

Phase 6 — Main content (during the event)

Throughout the broadcast, the virtual encoder continues pushing the asset to every destination in real time. Even though the file already exists on disk, viewers experience it as a live event with all the usual rules:

Viewers cannot skip ahead of the live moment.
Viewers can rewind to revisit content they missed, then jump back to the current live point.
Social platforms display the broadcast with their usual 'LIVE' indicators, chat, reactions, and engagement features.
Your Control Panel shows live status, viewer counts (where available), and any health metrics from each destination.

Phase 7 — End event

When the asset reaches its end, the virtual encoder gracefully closes each output stream. Facebook Live and YouTube Live end the broadcast on their side. The Sardius Player stops the live stream.

Common timing questions

Why does the encoder need 3–5 minutes of warm-up?

Because it is connecting to multiple destinations at once and each handshake takes time. Sardius reserves enough runway to make sure every connection is healthy before viewers ever see anything. A faster warm-up window would risk one or more destinations starting late or not at all.

Can I shorten or skip the warm-up?

No. The warm-up is a system requirement, not a setting. Skipping it would jeopardize stream stability. If you need to publish content immediately and the platform is taking too long, that is usually a sign you should pre-schedule rather than try to start ad hoc.

What if I notice the broadcast started a few seconds after the scheduled time?

If you notice your broadcast is starting 60-90 seconds late, then it’s possible your pre-roll bumper was not properly added to the channel.

What happens if a social destination fails to connect?

The broadcast continues to every destination that did connect successfully. You will see the failed destination flagged inside the Control Panel. In most cases the issue is on the social platform side (revoked token, deleted page, throttled account, invalid stream key, etc.).

How to troubleshoot like an operator

If something goes wrong, use the timeline above as a diagnostic map:

Stream did not start at all → Check Phase 1 (was the event scheduled correctly?) and Phase 4 (did sync/verify report an error?).
Stream started late or dropped at the very beginning → Phase 3 (pre-roll TIME) is the prime suspect.
Audio is out of sync → re-validate the source file.
Bumper played but the main content did not → Phase 6 issue with the asset; inspect the file.
Worked on Sardius Player but failed on a social platform → Phase 3 destination handshake; check tokens and platform status.

Action plan

Always schedule Advanced SimLive events at least 30 minutes in advance to give the platform full standby time.
Validate your MP4 asset (codec, container, resolution, duration) before scheduling.
Confirm your social destinations have valid, current credentials inside the Control Panel.
Add a pre-roll bumper at the front of your asset for a polished viewer experience.
Run at least one dry-run event to a private destination before going live to your real audience.
Bookmark this timeline so you can quickly diagnose where to look if something drifts.