Detecting the State of a Dish Receiver

[donstephens]

I was wondering if anyone could suggest a circuit to detect the status lights on my Dish receiver.
I need to detect if if the thing is active or not. I am a lame electronics guy but can do some rudimentary soldering.

I was planning on hooking up some sort of sensor on one of the analog input ports of my SECU16-I but don't have a clue what to use to detect the light or how to physically hook it up.

Thanks;
Don Stephens

 

[WayneW]

A photocell is probably your starting point, depending upon LED size & placement and how important appearances are.
This should get you started, or search here for "photocell"
http://www.cocoontech.com/forums/index.php...mp;hl=photocell

 

[Michael McSharry]

The modern Dish receivers have an ethernet connection that Dish does provide a web interface to access the reciever via the internet. If Dish has published or someone has decoded the protocol then this would be a good way to determine the state of the receiver.