[Thunderbolt Q&A, Help & Troubleshooting] loonatik78:
Ok... Got to a real keyboard so I'll toss some answered out there and try to put some structure to the not so structured wealth of information...

One: Synergy is probably the most tweaked up ROM out there. If you're looking for something that's simply bullet-proof reliable, I highly recommend BAMF Forever. Chingy also has some good ROMs in the Gingeritis line. BAMF can be found at teambamf.com and Chingy's ROMs are at themilkmik.com.

If those prove too modified, there's a few debloated ROMs based off the latest OTA patched up to fix the problems with the OTA version.

Two: You wouldn't be looking for a .zip for Titanium Backup. You'd be looking for an .apk file. Not sure where to find that though. Not may devs pack a backup app with their ROM because tastes vary and TiBu isn't the only app that does what it does.

Three: You pretty much have the idea regarding Clockwork backups (a.k.a., nandroid backups). I will direct you to my Q&A thread linked in my sig regarding TiBu. Basically, doing a batch backup is all good, but doing a batch restore is an excellent way to render your ROM useless. Devs use different apps and versions and frameworks and the system data often doesn't work well one ROM to another.

Four: Regarding CWR and Rom Manager, pretty much every dev recommends against using Rom Manager for flashing their ROM. There seems to be issues for whatever reason and it's just proven unreliable over time. A custom recovery is the only good way to flash a ROM and perform the various utility functions a custom recovery affords. You have your choice between CWR, Amon Ra, and TeamWin.

Five: Let me break this down into the 6 basic kinds of flashable files. First, and most common is a ROM. This is the OS, kernel, and UI along with whatever apps the dev has added They are usually 250MB to 310MB .zip files.

Second would be a kernel. ROMs are packed with kernel, but custom kernels exist that may be better for your purposes.

Third, would be radios. Radios can be individual radio firmwares, or a pair of them for CDMA and LTE all in one .zip file. A pair will be roughly 24-25MB, a single radio roughly half that. I explain more about radios in my thread.

Forth would be custom recoveries. These you rarely need to flash, perhaps never, so long as the version you're using supports the ROM's that are out there, and just about every version out there for the Tbolt does.

Fifth would be bootloaders. This is something you pretty much NEVER need to flash unless you've got a pretty good reason to mess with it. Bad radio and bootloader flashes will brick your device.

Sixth would be an RUU. An RUU is a full firmware package for your device. New bootloader, stock recovery, stock kernel, stock ROM, and radios.

There are also mods and patches that you can flash as well. Those are done in the same way as ROMs and kernels. The firmware hierarchy would look something like [bootloader>radio>recovery>ROM] with the bootloader being about as basic as it gets. Once you get used to how all this fits together it will make a lot of sense.

Hope this helps. If you have further questions feel free to hit me up on gtalk, pm me here, or post in this thread or my Q&A thread. I'll get back with you ASAP.