Hi Dickens,
I'm an absolute novice with DCC but I go along with Frame69 in that DCC should give you more options and control of your accessories, points and locomotives etc. Plus, if you are just starting out with it and not converting layouts and locomotives, I believe it will represent fair value for money.
So, as a novice who has only ever used the Hornby Select unit, my views may or may not help.
Main features for the Hornby Select that we have include the address storing of up to 59 locomotives, 40 accessories and can run up to 10 engines at a time providing you have enough power.
We currently use 2 x Hornby Digital Select controllers connected together by a RJ12 6 pin buddy cable, so that two trains can be controlled simultaneously and independently on a 6' x 4' layout. I guess the result is similar to having a Hornby Elite, which has a few more features, and a better user display.
For example, with the Select units you rely heavily on numbers and button sequences and I personally struggle to remember or reference our locomotive addresses / numbers little own the addresses of multiple lights, points and other accessories, so I imagine a more detailed user interface / display would play a big part in simplifying the control of multiple tasks etc.
Our reason for having two controls connected together on the same layout was born from the fact that both my lad and I like to use the layout at the same time. So from the moment we converted it to DCC, it was evident that for our needs, dual control DCC is better suited to how we individually like to control the running of multiple trains on one layout.
All in all, we have found the little Select unit easy to use, simple to learn and we are more than happy with it for what we are doing at the moment, but it does have some limitations if you want to get the most out of DCC.
In time, I know we will outgrow this controller and like a lot of others have suggested, there are some very, very good controllers out there so until then, we will happily enjoy what we have and hope you enjoy your layout as it progresses in either DC or DCC
Cheers,
Darrell