electricalgrounding
I got this 5V DC 8A power supply for some 5V LED strips. For the AC input connections it has Line, Neutral, and Ground (numbers 1, 2, and 3 in attached image).
My question: For the 120V AC input is the Ground required or optional?
This project (power supply and LED strips) will be installed indoors.
The power rating of the supply must be higher than the power rating of the load -- so based on the numbers, yes, this seems sensible.
However, the strip lights themselves will not support running that much current through them -- which means you can't just daisy-chain all the strips lights.
From https://www.pololu.com/product/2547:
The voltage drop means you'll have dimmer LEDs.. and at some point they'll stop working entirely. To get around this, you should provide power to each strip. You can interconnect the data lines, but separate power wires should be run to each segment. How long the segments are really depends on how much voltage drop you can tolerate (how dim the LEDs at the end get).
You can use a voltage drop calculator (Google it) to figure out the size of wire you should use for the distance and power draw -- but expect to probably run 18 or 16awg wire from your power supply to the segment.
It may also make sense to use multiple smaller power supplies (with shorter runs), depending on your distances, room layout, etc.
If you don't have one, you need a grounding terminal.
Wiring a panel is not difficult, but definitely check your local code to make sure that panel wiring isn't required to be done by a licensed electrician.
All of your other questions can be answered with simple Google searches. You should really do research on your own before asking very broad questions.
Best Answer
Ground connection is a safety feature, and should be connected.
If something breaks internally in the power supply or wiring which causes the case to be energized, the ground connection means it'll blow the breaker/fuse and power will be shut off.
Without it, the case can become energized with no indication anything is wrong until someone touches it (at which point they can be electrocuted).