I keep coming up with silly little queries and ideas (and I know all of you do to) and it seems silly to make separate threads about them, so I'm starting this one. Feel free to use it as a springboard for your stupid questions and your off the wall suggestions. :D

To get it started, the Tutorials and Wikis make small cells sounds REALLY REALLY bad, like you are begging for riots, and I'm wondering if this is an exaggeration on their part. I keep looking at other players' layouts and they have these neat teeny tiny little cells with no worries, meanwhile I'm so paranoid I keep giving my cons fucking penthouse suits. :P
Am I showing WAAAAY too much concern for them?

The wiki for the game on the devs' site can be quite useful as a reference despite it being contradictory on occasion and in need of a little updating in places. http://devwiki.introversion.co.uk/pa/index.php/Main_Page (You mention it but I thought I'd link it)

As for the cell quality thing. I have never found satisfied prisoners will riot about their minimum sized cell. But that might be because I haven't played any 1 game long enough. However the wiki says that only below average cells make prisoners unhappy. Therefore equally crap cells should be fine.

Actually 3x4 is what I give them and it's taking up too much damn space! XD I'm thinking of scaling it down to the minimum.

Never occurred to me change that! :P Just now figured out how to change the prisoner intake. I'm still learning the nuances here, that's why I made this thread.

Please be gentle, and don't send me to the Hole! :P

Well I have our dear Sachys in my place right now. I wish they would hurry up and get those updates in. I know of at least three others in here (myself included) waiting to be entered into the system.

My ambition is to have the entire forum locked up.

Before the room quality update a while back my max cell size was 2x3, now its 3x3 as standard - except for death row - you do NOT want those guys unhappy as they've usually been legendary cons in my prior clinks.Once had one go on a rampage - took down half the guards and triggered a riot among the other inmates that burned down half the prison before the fire service even arrived.
Whatever you do, make sure you cram a tv and radio in there - doesnt matter how much crap you put in the cell / how cramped it is as a result - just that they have the mod-con-cons.

Also, as B0SC0 said - get them on plenrty of programs from the start (workshop is the best one for ensuring you have a good cashflow).

Right now I have 2, 20 cell blocks at 2x3 (and 4 1x3 solitary cells per block) and everyone seems okay, minus the guy I put in solitary for trying to smuggle a cell phone in from his visitation. :P

I went ahead and started the Work Program research and am still considering TVs in the cells though I have a really nice rec room for them with phones, pool table, and several TVs.

Of course I'm working with unlimited funds. Not really proud of that. :P

You really need to do that to begin with - particularly to see just how bad things can get and why.

Cry.

...and maybe do a shakedown too - but be warned as it may cause a riot.

Edit: and if you do the latter be careful of two things:
1) prisoners in shackles sometimes get stuck to walls and become unsearchable and prolong the shakedown and thusly cause a lot more heat in the prison.
2) if you do the shakedown, its best to do it in conjunction with the tool cleanup grant


...Edit2:

Of course a well patrolled perimeter wall with an additional internal wall also helps - but I'll be damned if I can find a way to afford one without sandbox mode!

Hmmm... never really thought about it, but dont think I had more than about 40 guards when I had 1000 inmates - been a while since I built a clink that big, and no longer have those saves due to a dead HD.*

Another good way to prevent escapes is to get some snitches (under the intelligence tab) - they'll often reveal tunnels if activated at night, BUT... they also have a habit of getting killed for it / other bad things happens as a result.

Edit: *that was micromanagement hell though - had to ensure all different levels of con were seperated, cctv everywhere, I think 25% of the guards were dog handlers. NO armed guards - only hire them to get that grant money unless you have supermax cons.