“We recommend SanDisk and Samsung because those brands are have a history of reliability. There are knockoffs that appear on Amazon. Kingston, PNY, and other brands have put out unreliable products in the past so we cannot recommend them.”
Transcend is trash and their 8GB cards are dubious.
Any MicroUSB power supply will work that provides at least 1.5A and not just on the label.
Either image should work. For the lite image, remember that you need to setup the account before you put the MicroSD card in. See the Raspbian release notes.