Morning all!
So far, I haven't found a Sense 3.0 ROM that will send or receive MMS for me. Currently downloading Virtuous Unity to give it a go.
The fact that it is similar in look and feel to the Stock ROM is one reason I recommend it for a first custom ROM. You might want to look into SetCPU (it's a paid app on the Market). It will allow you to set your processor speed based on certain conditions. For example, I have my processor speeds set to min 245MHz and max 768Mhz normally. By slowing the speed, the processor doesn't use as much battery, and for my everyday use, I don't notice any performance hit compared to 1Ghz. Another battery saver is that I set my speeds to min 245, max 384 when the screen is off to further reduce the processor's power draw. There are also custom kernels that will allow you to lower the frequency to a minimum of 128 MHz and increase the maximum to 1.15 GHz, though different phones react differently to clock speeds above 1 GHz and in my opinion, the (real world) performance gains realized by the higher clock speeds do not offset the additional drain on the battery and stress on the processor.