Concerns about betta fish tank in screening room

[199211]

Well, this is interesting. My main hobby is film criticism and record collecting, so I'm a bit stunned to find myself on a forum about aquariums of all things. I'm completely new to this hobby and I was looking into getting a 5-gallon aquarium and betta fish for a shelf in my room. I did my research on tank sizes, heaters, filters, plants, and so forth. Then I began having second thoughts. My two concerns involve power consumption and noise. The first reservation comes from the components in my room. I'm an amateur film critic, and my bedroom doubles as my screening room. The equipment I use (TV, amplification, DVD player, subwoofer) each require thier own power source, and my fear is that with a pump and a heater running at the same time as a movie, I'll end up blowing a fuse halfway through a film. My second concern is whether the noise from the movie and vibrations from my subwoofer would cause stress to the fish. Would the fish be comfortable during a loud movie, and would the power be overloaded if a filter and heater were in use? Please excuse the longwinded nature of this post.

[Aiken Drum]

A 5 gallon tank is going to have very minimal power usage.

Unless the noise from your tv setup is causing the neighbours to bang on the walls complaining resulting in environmental health turning up at your door to serve you notice that your noise levels are in excess of environmental limits it wont be an issue. Many people keep their fish tank underneath or adjacent to TVs just fine. We watch movies all the time, and our neighbours do complain about the noise sometimes, and our fish are fine in the same room.

[199211]

So then there's little chance of a blown duse during a 3 hour movie?

[Aiken Drum]

Not unless what you already have is already right on the limit and you are already blowing fuses whenever you turn on an extra light. Charging your phone and turning on a desklamp at the same time would be more likely to cause a blown fuse. If a tiny fish tank is going to cause a blown fuse you need to consider what you already have going on.

[ADsnail]

Of more concern might be light. Even though you turn the tank light off at a certain time each evening, light from the movies would be seen by fish. They have no eyelids, so he'll need some deep dark places to sleep while you watch things that flash, sometimes brightly, into the room. May I suggest a 10 gallon tank? That's generally considered the comfort size to keep a betta happy, and you'd have more places - decor, plants (real or fake), and hiding places.

My bettas actually watch TV with us. They're drawn to the light and movement and will wearily stay up as long as possible, like children who don't want to miss anything by going to bed. They're jammed up against the glass as close to the screen in the room as possible, leading me to feel guilty for keeping them up. So I lean a piece of black cardboard on the TV side of tanks at bedtime, giving them more darkness.