I still find it suspicious that the disappearance occurred in a narrow time window between handoff from Malaysian ATC and pickup by Vietnamese ATC. IF foul play is assumed (still a big IF), how likely is it that someone other than the Cap and/or FO would be able to act on this knowledge?

If foul play is not involved and the plane didn't disintegrate in mid-air, it seems that circumstances would require, at the least, failure of the transponder, failure of voice comm and failure of nav (compass, beacon, etc.) all at approximately the same time. Add to that a possible electrical failure of onboard instrumentation. How likely is it that the 777 suffered such an electrical failure that took out all those systems at around 1:20 am and left the pilots truly flying blind? Would a crew experience on that flight path have been able to chart a rough course using celestial sightings or is that just too much TV talking?

P.S. Just as a matter of curiosity, if a transponder was having problems would the crew turn it off and on in an attempt to "reset" it?

P.P.S. If the plane suffered a catastrophic breakup along its intended flight path I would think that a debris field would have been easily found.