I recently purchased five LED strips online (these specifically: http://www.ebay.com/itm/331059064977) to hang up along the outline of my room. Each strip is 5m (16.4 ft.) long, requires 12 V DC to power, and dissipates 0.08 W/LED.
Each strip dissipates 48 W, meaning that at the recommended 12 V DC, there would be a current of 4 A.
I planned on soldering the five of them together in series so that I could have one long chain of LEDs that will only require one power source. However, I am slightly confused regarding what adapter I should purchase that will power the chain.
Each strip seems to come with two cables attached to both sides (power and ground); I'm a little confused regarding this, because I know that LEDs should be forward biased, so why would both sides require power and ground?
Also, because I will have five strips, should I be passing 60 V DC through the entire thing if it's recommended to only pass 12 V DC for each strip? I just want to make sure that I don't blow anything up accidentally by exceeding the maximum rated amperage (I probably wouldn't want to go over 4 A if possible).