Here are just a few details about the lighting hardware:

• I put up 2 of the 15 ft (ok, ok, 5 meter) strips and used an adapter to plug them into the same ceiling-mounted sockets.
• Holy cow! It's incredibly bright. I have to wear sunglasses in there now. For now, I can control them with the existing wall switch.
• The LED strips I choose were SMD 5630, "warm warm" or "natural warm" color, 60 LEDs/meter.
• Each strip draws about 40-45 watts through the A/C power supply (measured, not theoretical). Someday I will figure out what that means for RMS and DC and such. Today is not that day.

Next post, the reason for the controller complexity....