I don't know if it'll start without the card, but if it does you should be able to get to the point dish screen, which would be what you want.
Using a dish receiver without a card to point dish, even to acquire a signal from Dish Network's 110/119 (or any other) satellite is prefect legal. As long as you're not trying to break past encryption or gain access to channels you don't have access to without a card/account, you're fine.
He'd be able to do the same thing with an FTA receiver, and those are perfectly legal, though again the same rules apply (getting past encryption or locked off channels would be hacking and THAT is illegal)