Stick with stuff you understand and hire someone to complete this task before getting hung up in your long underwear.

If you have both, use both of them. under normal AC operation, neither one will be used, so it is not that important anyway. If you really want to use just one of them, use the board.

From everything I've read online, the Timed Off Control (TOC) board is required to prevent short cycling, which mine was doing. Seems very important.

Ebay has that board for $40...and you can offer less.

OK, It is important, I take my word back. the only reason I said not important is because my AC short cycled a few times for the last 12 years. It did not hurt anything. Anyway, you can get one(HVAC delay relay) for $10 on Ebay, may be I'll get one too, like a cheap insurance.

Yah! I'll probably get one too and go ahead and change it out.