We’ve spent the last few days running all over Vegas gathering up gobs of pics and data to turn around, but earlier today this caught our eye.  We’d seen plenty of press pics of what Light Peak is supposed to look like, such as this one:

A Peek at Light Peak @ CES 2010 - Shows and Expos 6

This pic looks cool and all, but we hadn’t seen any of the actual connectors in practice, and it seemed impractical for end users to be futzing with the connector seen above.  Today we met with Intel to talk SSD (more to follow on that) and some other tech.  They had a sweet looking exhibit set up at the show:

A Peek at Light Peak @ CES 2010 - Shows and Expos 7

In one of the demo rooms, while being briefed by Intel, I spotted this little gem:

A Peek at Light Peak @ CES 2010 - Shows and Expos 8

Some of those extra wires are added after the fact, as it’s obviously a prototype board, but those thinner lines are not wires, they are fiber!

A Peek at Light Peak @ CES 2010 - Shows and Expos 9

Keep in mind this is not necessarily ‘final’ hardware and is subject to change, but this looks like a realistic possibility for a Light Peak connector.  USB-ish physical form factor with power and some signaling being supplied from the usual places (though the pins are not aligned the same).  Now for the good stuff:

A Peek at Light Peak @ CES 2010 - Shows and Expos 10

The fiber terminates at the end of each plug.  This would mate with a corresponding ‘end’ section of a device or cable connector.  Two fiber channels are necessary as each is unidirectional.

There’s much more to follow for our CES 2010 coverage, so stay tuned!