Considering re-entering the hobby after a forty year absence.
Thats a long time away! Well, maybe not "away", but stored in the back of your mind for some time. That's how I look at hobbies that sit on the back-burner for a while.
The club in town runs Digitrax and I have seen that in depth and run trains with it before. However, I have a preference for NCE when the time comes to set up DCC on my own layout. I like the layout and design of the cab controller. Moreover, I don't want a wired (plugged in) cab for the same reason
@D&J RailRoad and
@KB02 state - you can control trains from all around the layout, not just from where you have the cab controller. That may not seem like a big deal off the bat - but it will add another level of enjoyment of your layout. If you don't want to do wireless off the bat - you can upgrade a system with a wireless radio and controller. In the long run it will be more expensive to do it that way, as opposed to starting with it, but that would keep the entry cost down quite a bit up front to go with a non-wireless system.
For the size layout you are considering you do not need much power. Of course, the caveat to wiring the layout for DCC is there in that you need buss wire and feeders. You may end up with a lot of feeders and it may appear you are loading a good amount of track, however the current is going to flow to the decoders and locomotive motors. So if you only want 2 trains (I assume 2 locos at a time for yard switching mainly?) you will not have a whole lot of draw to warrant a higher amp power supply.
The NCE Starter Set is 2 amps - that would be plenty for your layout unless you start adding electronic switches, lights, signals, etc, etc. Then you might want to upgrade the power supply to 5 amps.
NCE DCC Online Store
www.ncedcc.com
Best of luck and have fun!