I am looking at the possibility of using a single RJ-45 with off the shelf CAT5 cable. There will be three half duplex signals all transmitted from the same side. These will never be faster than 50Mb/s with cables that are max 10m. There will also be a simple multidrop bidirectional interface that will be slow and used for control. I can use a LVDS-M device for this and terminate on both ends.
Since I have 4 channels and eight wires, there is no provision for ground returns.
Should the receivers be terminated with dual 50 ohm resistors tied to ground (as opposed to a single 100 ohm terminator)?
Do I need to add fast TVSs, etc like we might do with USB to keep from damaging devices (assume hot swap)?