Advantages of Packaged Terminal air conditioners
1. Quality.
PTAC air conditioners are commercial grade ACs that can literally last you 20 or more years.
2. Work as both air conditioners and heaters.
If you have ever stayed in a hotel that has a Packaged Terminal air conditioner installed in the room that you were sleeping in, you know very well how intensely cold that room can get using a PTAC.
You also know how hot one can get in the winter.
3. Energy efficient.
PTAC disadvantages
1. Installation
Not nearly the amount of installation that a mini split requires,
but installing a Packaged Terminal air conditioner does require a large rectangular hole to be cut through an entire wall. And for most people that means that they will have to hire an outside Carpenter to do the work.
The size of the hole that you are cutting pretty much dictates that you are invested in using the package terminal air conditioner for a very long time.
And once the hole is cut, you are stuck with that location for the air conditioner.
Of course you can always fix the wall if needed. But that would be an entire job on its own.
2. Single room only
PTAC air conditioners only work in the room that they are installed in.
And they are a point of origin type of air conditioner. In other words, they are very cold, the closer you are to the air conditioner.
Back to the hotel reference,
If you ever stayed in a room with two beds that used a PTAC air conditioner, you know that the bed closest to the air conditioner is going to be the one you want if you like to sleep with a lot of covers.
Otherwise, it may get a little warm on your side of the room.
3. Noise
Just like a window air conditioner, all the components of a HVAC system are located in one package with a Packaged Terminal air conditioner.
There is no getting away from the sound of the compressor running and cycling on and off while the air conditioner is on.
Because of that point, PTAC air conditioners are not very suitable for use in recording studios or podcast studios where you need as much quiet as you can get.