Just wanted to report back success here. I did order an EL1499ICA online, although what was shipped was an EL1499ICA-L, noted only on the mfr site as an economy version - but looked dimensionally similar to the original specs. I scheduled to have the electrician do it, less about the electrical than worrying about traversing 20' of attic and accidentally stepping through the ceiling drywall somewhere. Was very simple 10 minutes for the electrician to swap out the entire housing. Before he came, I did look at the housing and there is no way to remove the rectangular sealed box to just replace the transformer - it's basically riveted shut. He was the original electrician from the remodel - said 1 in a 100 of these fails, no good reason... I asked about what happens if one of the downstairs transformers fails, given no attic. He did confirm he could also access from the can itself via the ceiling, as brickeyee said, but it just takes more time and effort that way. I did see that removing three screws allows the can to drop out, although it did seem quite a pain to try to unscrew the old transformer from the housing blind (when your hand and screwdriver have reached into the opening). Would be a very challenging DIY attempt. Replacement housing works great, and learned a few things as a general DIY-er. Thanks, esp brickeyee, for the advice.

The Aculux housing in that link is a premium fixture. It comes with a stippled clear uniformity lens to eliminate striations without altering beam spread to help smooth out hot spots as you requested. It has better lamp positioning, too. Use a good lamp like GE constant color. FNV lamps are about 55 degree beam spread if you need it wider. EXN is the 40 degree normal flood everyone stocks. Almost no one stocks constant color so you might have to order. Philips is supposed to have a comparable constant color lamp but I've not tried them side by side. One reason recessed is so popular compared with track is that track adds visual clutter with the strip of track and fixtures hanging down from the ceiling. Many object to recessed fixtures with anything sticking out of the ceiling as some trims do. 4" or 3" low voltage reduces the aperture size for less of a hole in the ceiling. It is not uncommon to use a slot aperture trim and have them painted to match the ceiling for minimal ceiling interruption. For insulated ceilings use IC airtight housings and fully insulate around/above them to minimize energy losses. In the Aculux line there is a lensed wall washer that helps spread the light. It has photometrics listed to work with. This link shows the slot aperture style trim. Here is a link that might be useful: Juno Aculux oval slot adjustable

As noted a light directly over the range will put a bright spot on the hood and a shadow on the range top. Offsetting them to each side is the best approach. Lighting on kitchen counters is a conundrum. 18" back from the cabinets puts the light directly on your head unless the lamp can be aimed toward the cabinets which is more expensive (often over the budget/allowance). Non-adjustable fixtures at 8" from the cabinets provide good lighting but will throw a scalloped hot spot on the cabinets (only one client has liked that). Wall washer fixtures will throw a soft continuous light on the cabinets and counters but there are few choices of inexpensive fixtures especially if the ceiling is insulated. I've never solved this problem the same way twice because people have such different tolerances and prejudices for lighting. If the fixtures are 5" diam. and 33" apart I recommend A-lamp Wall Washers with an Alzak reflector (haze/clear diffuse) or an eyelid type. If you want more light try 4" adjustable Low voltage MR16 fixtures.

Oh, there's a huge difference. I switched in the new bulbs, saw how different it looked, and then brought my wife in and asked her if she noticed anything different (she did know that I had bought the LEDs). She said that she could get used to it and it's good that our electric bill will go down, but everything looked different. The light was spread out more evenly than before, but it was sort of cloudy and harder to see things even though they were at full power. Dimming them only made it worse. When our 24 year old son, who didn't know about it, came into the kitchen, the first thing he said was, "What the heck happened in here? This looks awful!"