“Danbocchi,” “OTODASU,” or your homemade 0.5 tatami DIY soundproof booth. While they provide a soundproof environment easily, what you inevitably face in summer is the “indoor sauna phenomenon.” The heat from your PC and your body has nowhere to escape, and you reach your limit within just tens of minutes of starting.
In an ultra-compact booth with no installation hole for an air conditioner (wall-mounted cooler) and no place to put an outdoor unit, how should you fight the “scorching heat”? This article explains the “ultimate heat exhaust and ventilation techniques” that can be realized without large-scale construction.
1. The Cause of the Tragedy: Stop Cohabiting with “PC Heat Exhaust”#
The thing generating the most heat inside an ultra-small booth is not the human, but the “PC (especially gaming PCs).” The first basic step and best specific remedy is “kicking the heat source (PC main unit) out of the booth.”
The “Main Unit Separation” Operation via Long Cables#
Place the PC main unit outside the soundproof room (in a cool room) and only pull the cables for the monitor, keyboard, mouse, and audio interface into the booth.
- Video Cables: If you use high-quality “optical fiber HDMI cables,” etc., a delay will not occur even with several meters of extension.
- USB Cables: Place a self-powered USB hub (with an AC adapter) inside the booth, and connect it to the PC main unit with a long USB cable.
- Effect: Just doing this can dramatically slow down the speed at which the indoor temperature rises.
2. Invest in “Ventilation Fans,” Not Electric Fans#
Even if you run an electric fan or a circulator inside the room, it only stirs up the hot air, and the temperature will not drop. What you need is “forced intake and exhaust.”
Building a DIY Ventilation Fan with a Silencer#
If it is a DIY booth where you can make holes in the walls, build a ventilation system combining multiple silent case fans for PCs (120mm or 140mm).
- Intake at the “Bottom,” Exhaust at the “Top”: Utilize the property (stack effect) where cold air enters from below and warm air accumulates at the top.
- Homemade Silencer (Muffler Box): If you attach a fan directly to the wall, the sound will pass straight through. By making a “box where air bends and passes through in a crank shape (like a maze)” using MDF material and sound-absorbing material (glass wool, etc.), and attaching it to the outside of the fan, you can let the air through while maintaining soundproofing performance.
3. The Brute-Force Method: “Freezing” the Outside Room#
The ultimate countermeasure is “lowering the temperature setting of the air conditioner in the parent room (such as the living room) where the soundproof room is placed to the absolute limit you can stand (e.g., 18°C - 20°C).”
“Directly Pulling” Cold Air with a Duct#
After cooling the parent room, an even more powerful measure is the utilization of a “flexible duct.”
- Fix (or point) one end of an aluminum bellows duct (you can buy this at a home center or on Amazon) near the outlet of the air conditioner in the parent room.
- Connect the other end to the intake port of the soundproof room (or the intake side of your DIY fan).
- This allows the cold air from the air conditioner to be blown directly into the booth, functioning quite powerfully as a substitute for a spot cooler.
Conclusion: Survive the Summer in an Ultra-Small Booth by “Systematizing It in Advance”#
- Absolutely move the PC main unit out of the booth (separating heat exhaust).
- Instead of an electric fan, build a “PC fan ventilation” system with silencer boxes.
- Ultimately, run the parent room’s air conditioner at full blast and pull in the cold air with a duct.
The risk of “heatstroke” is no joke. Before the real summer arrives, build an exhaust/ventilation system via DIY and secure a safe, comfortable working environment.
