Hi guys,
I was recently given a Skytex sx-e700 netbook for free and figured i could use it for school. I am a student at PTI and am currently learning about linux. The only thing I want to do on this netbook is play around with the terminal but there is one major problem... there is no way to access the terminal via the GUI. I have tried everything i can think of and I have googled every possible combination of words that might help me with this problem. It almost seems like i have the only netbook in the world with this particular OS installed. The user manual doesnt specify what OS is installed but google seems to think it is PC linux OS. Ive viewd some screenshots of PC linux OS and it looks similar but still very different. there is no start bar, no menus, no anything that a 5 year old couldn't navigate. The only possible solution i can think of would be to use the text editor(leafpad) to create a script that would open the terminal but I dont even know if you can do that in linux. Im talking about creating the linux equivalent of a batch file containing command.com. Can someone please help me with this? i'm at my wits end!

http://www.pclinuxos.com/ is the main website for the OS that model seems to have.

I actually checked that site already and my OS looks nothing like any of the ones that they offer. The full monty version looks the most similar because my desktop has tabs across the top named Internet, Work, Play, Settings, and Others. Each tab has a number of applications that do not function properly for one reason or another. The taskbar across the bottom is blue by default and contains a red circle with a power icon on the left that allows me to "Log out the system now". next to that is a green button with a picture of tools on it that opens it's ghetto version of a task manager. Next to these two icons are my running programs and then finally the time. I've decided that i want to try and wipe this OS and put a less shitty one on but im not sure if I can because of another problem it has.. when i plug in my usb drive it shows up on the task bar but there is absolutely no way to access the drive from anything on the GUI. If i could figure out how to open terminal on here it might be possible but I know almost nothing about linux so i have no idea how. If i cant figure this out at least ill get some relief in punting that bitch down the street haha.

does the keyboard have the "windows" key on it, between left cntrl and alt? (I know there's a proper linux name for that key,but i can never remember it)

There is a key with three Z's on it between ctrl and alt

Your netbook is a rebranded SkyTone Alpha 400 with a MIPS based processor. The distro is unique to those machines and is based on Debian with a Matchbox desktop. (There are better distros for that box, particularly 3MX, if you're willing to do some work.) I wrote an article for O'Reilly on these machines a couple of years back at: http://broadcast.oreilly.com/2009/05...the-150-1.html There are links to resources for this machine in that article.

HTH,
Caitlyn