Mission controllers Endeavour to achieve Monday launch

Despite more clouds on the horizon, NASA fueled Endeavour for the second straight night Sunday in hopes of sending the shuttle on the last big space station construction mission.
The launch team began pumping millions of gallons of fuel into Endeavour just as the Super Bowl was kicking off to the south in Miami. NASA's launch director, Mike Leinbach, told his controllers to be at their computers, ready to support the launch, football or not. He said there would be no distractions in the firing room, scene of all the shuttle monitoring.
Endeavour and its crew of six were scheduled to blast off at 4:14 a.m. Monday with a new room and observation deck for the International Space Station.

Sunday morning's try was spoiled by thick, low clouds. The clouds were back Sunday night, but forecasters said it looked more favorable than the previous night and they put the odds of acceptable conditions at 60 percent.
It was the last scheduled night launch for the space shuttle program, winding down after nearly 30 years. After this one, just four flights remain.
Commander George Zamka and his crew awoke after sleeping through the afternoon. They will work the overnight shift in orbit during their two-week mission.

If Endeavour does not make it off the ground Monday, NASA officials said they would probably not try again Tuesday, given the exhausting middle-of-the-night schedule. An unmanned rocket with a solar observatory would have a chance to fly next, on Wednesday, and the shuttle would get in line behind that, later in the week.
"That's space 'biz!" space station commander Jeffrey Williams said in a Twitter update live from orbit. "We on ISS now have some extra prep time."Endeavour is loaded with two major payloads: the Tranquility living quarters and a seven-windowed dome that will give space station residents sweeping 360-degree views of their orbital home, as well as Earth and outer space.Both compartments are courtesy of the European Space Agency. They're worth more than $400 million.The space station will be 98 percent complete once Tranquility and the dome are installed. The Endeavour crew will conduct three spacewalks to hook up everything.

As for the Super Bowl unfolding 200 miles south of Kennedy Space Center, the coin used in the opening toss flew on the last shuttle mission, in November. A former wide receiver, Leland Melvin, was on that flight. He was picked by the Detroit Lions in the NFL draft in 1986, but injured his hamstring and went on — famously — to science and space-flying careers.No, the shuttle crew did not watch the Super Bowl, NASA's launch commentator said. But the game was beamed up to the space station in case the five men there wanted to see it.

Wind U135 – The Newest Version from MSI Available For Worldwide

MSI has just announced the worldwide availability of the MSI Wind U135. The Netbook will retail for $309.99 and up (weirdly enough I think that I have seen the base version for $316.99 on Amazon…). We've told you about it before, so the only news is availability and pricing, but if you missed the previous post, the Netbook's N450 processor consumes only 7 Watt and MSI expects the battery life to be 15% better, when compared to previous models. On the performance side, they mention 10%, but it really depends on what you are doing. To help users manage the battery life, MSI has included a utility that lets one choose between several "modes": Gaming, Movie, Presentation, Document and Turbo Battery.

Wind models are based on the Atom N450 processor running at 1.66GHz with HyperThreading enabled. The chip itself can support 64-bit, however as MSI decided to include Windows 7 Starter Edition, you're left with 32-bit. This is coupled to 1GB of DDR2 and a 250GB WD Blue SATA disk with tests showing an average 57MBps read rate. The specification is very similar to Asus' Eee PC 1005PE except for the higher quality webcam. Intel's N450 does have DirectX 9 support but drawing the frames by hand would provide a better gaming experience. The 10-inch 1024x600 screen first championed by MSI is now pretty much the standard across the board but this particular unit is more acceptable than most. Thanks to the LED backlighting, brightness and contrast are above average for netbook screens. There's also good connectivity with three USB 2 sockets, Ethernet, headphone and microphone jacks and VGA output. Removable storage comes in the form of an SD Card slot.

The very Netbook-looking Netbook comes in charcoal, silver, ruby, or sapphire, aka black, silver, red, or blue, with a film-printed shiny coating. New to the Wind U135 is a raised chiclet keyboard, so that the Netbook joins the ranks of nearly every other laptop nowadays. A new, larger touch pad has also been added. Five different power management settings are built in--not that we have ever had to concern ourselves with power efficiency on a Netbook.

MSI Wind U135 Specifications:

Windows 7 Starter Edition (32-bit)
10.1-inch diagonal WSVGA (1024x600)
Intel Atom N450 Processor 1.66GHz (667MHz FSB, 512KB Cache)
1GB DDR2 SDRAM onboard (1 slot available)
Intel GMA 3150 integrated graphics
250GB Seagate 5400.6 Hard Drive
802.11BGN 1T1R Wi-Fi, Bluetooth
4-in-1 media card slot
Dimensions: 10.24"(L) x 7.09"(D) x 0.74"~1.24"(H)
Weight: 2.87lbs(not including weight of AC adapter)
6-cell Lithium-Ion battery (5200mAh, 58Wh)

Tata Consultancy services ( TCS ) website TCS.com hacked

TCS Hacked! If you visit the Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) website tcs.com right now, the top Indian tech company’s site has been hacked and a “For Sale” sign is displayed on the site with a notice that the tcs.com domain name is for sale. It points out prospective domain name buyers to a contact email address.

Tata Consultancy Services Limited (TCS) is the top software services and consulting company in India and is the largest provider of information technology and business process outsourcing services in India. TCS is a subsidiary of one of India’s largest and oldest conglomerates, the Tata Group.

It is unbelievable that some hacker could easily hack into one of the most secure websites of the top technology company in India. Its a Sunday evening here in India and I wonder if someone at TCS is looking into it…