Here's what I did.

1. A dust collector collects airborne dust is in circulation. In other words, it is filtering the air as you work (sanding) but not instantaneously.

2. You can breath a lot of dust as you're sanding with even the best dust collector in the world running.

I installed a powerful exhaust fan on the inside door of my basement going out to the steel (Bilco) door. I have an additional door on it so I can close it off as needed. It's 1 1/2 HP 16 in fan - very powerful suction flow.

Since kayak building is very sanding intensive, (more than most woodworking projects) I open up the Bilco door and fire up the exhaust fan and open up one cellar window for air as I sand. I also have a vac attached orbital with the vac outside the cellar door and tubed through to the inside so no exhaust vac air comes in. I just deal with the cold and usually it's fine because I'm sanding for an hour or so and that's it. When I'm done, I leave the exhaust fan on for a half hour and come back later to close up the window and fan opening and the bilco door.

Whenever possible I drag things up to the garage for sanding with the door open or outside. Until I did this, I had sawdust collecting everywhere. I think air filters are good but as I said, you can still breathe a lot of dust with one going if you're sanding.

Plus I wear a mask while sanding.