Would it be better to ask these question in one of the other forums?

I would want a voltage regulator like this for a stable power supply?

I think I will have two arduinos.  They aren't expensive.  One for the VU meter display.  The other for the led accent lighting.

http://www.arduino.cc/playground/Main/UsbMemory

That is a possibility for storing files.

Yes, I will take it one step at a time.  The first step is to get an adruino and some tlc chips.  At minimum I can get basic lighting on the bike a I go through each step.  Putting the SD card on will be one of the last features.  Right now I am more interested in just sequencing the lights and having a remote to control it.  Then I would like VU meter interactivity.  I plan on having the VU meter on the edge of my windshield.  I am going to get my windshield etched with a wolf track pattern across the bottom.  So the leds on the side of the windshield will light that up.  The SD card is just a luxury.  If I can easily swap out animation information it would be nice.

As for power if there is a way to get smooth power I am all ears.  Here is my plan for power.  LEDs don't take up much power, probably even with the adruino.  But if I am at a bike show for a couple of hours I don't want my battery to be drained to the point it won't start the bike.  So I am going to do a little trick used with boats that want trolling motors to run while the boat is turned off.  This product along with a small pocketbike battery that will be dedicated to to lighting system - properly fused and such of course.  It depends on what I have room for.  It depends on how I lay out everything on the bike.

I don't think I need many LEDs.  But if they are RBG that means I need 3 times as many TLC chips as a solid color.  I am thinking 4 along each side, 2 on each side in the rear fender, 2 on each side under the tank lighting up the engine, 2 one each side in front fender, then the 10 for the 6 led stereo windshield VU meter.  That's 32 leds organized in an ideal fashion for tlc chip placement.  Since it is easy to daisy chain them one set of tlcs will be under the tank handling the 16 LEDs in the center and rear of the bike.  The other set of tlcs can handle the 16 LEDs on the front.

So the question is would 6 be too many?  I'm not sure how the chips work, if there are code limits and physical limits.  Or is there an alternative?

I am a software guy, but I can read a schematic.  I do light electronics as a hobby.  I've built several stomp boxes for my bass guitar.  I can follow the instruction, but I don't have the knowledge to modify a circuit much.

Is there a good article on debugging the code?

Hello.  I am a computer programmer, though I haven't done low level programming in some time.  The software side I think I know what to do.  It's the hardware side I am having trouble with.

So, let's start with what I want my project to do.  I want to do some custom lighting on my motorcycle.  I would like to put a bunch of LEDs organized around the bike.  I want to be able to create custom animations, one being a VU meter that will connect into the stereo/ipod.  The LEDs will be RGB.

I've been looking at different solutions to this.  The arduino seems like it might do what I want and be economical.  I saw that you can control many LEDs using daisy chained TLC5940 chips.  I was wondering what the max number of tlc chips that could be used.  

While researching the arduino I saw someone that interfaced with an SD card.  That could be useful.  I would like to have a fat formated SD card that I can put animation information on, assuming I use the tlc chips that has an animation function.  It would seem the SD card and tlc chips would want to use the same pins on the arduino, is that going to be a problem?  Can that be changed?  Also I am a little confused on how to read from the sd card.  I would want to populate the card with individual files for each animation.  Would that be possible?

As an add on I might get a3 or 4 channel rf remote.  Buttons would be on/off, animation change, and color change.  Certain animations will use a solid color that can be changed.  Some animation will use their own colors.  I was thinking of one animation that the entire bike would be lit up with half brightness with a full brightness spot rotating around the bike.

My bike has a fairing so the electronics can be in there safe from weather.  The bike should provide 12v-14v DC of power which should be fine, correct?

I am looking for suggestions on how to accomplish this idea.  Thanks.