None of the boats in the Portland Christmas ships (to my knowledge at least) use 12volt lights to any significant extent. I think it would be difficult to pull off, and that the lights themselves tend not to be as bright, cost-effective, or come in longer runs. Might depend, though, on your decorating theme.
LED lights are making it much more possible to run the lights off the inverter. My inverter problem appears to have been unrelated to running the lights. I had an amazing amount of lighting on the boat (I would estimate nearly 300 ft of LED rope light, a 4' high Christmas tree with led lights, two strings of LED 5mm mini lights, and a few miscellaneous strings of mostly LED light for a display on the back of the boat. All that added up to just a little over 250 watts.
Still, from what I could see of how the other boats did thing, most appear to prefer a generator. I have to agree that something like the Honda 2000 is so reliable and efficient that, even with my new inverter, I may just stick with it. I thought it would be a hassle to hook up, keep gassed up, etc. But it wasn't at all.
The generator is a big expense, though. With LED lighting, you probably don't have to go that route. Your inverter should be able to handle it.
Hope that helps!
- Gini
