I guess the best recovery with working nandroid backup is TWRP from here:
http://en.miui.com/thread-13092-1-1.html
Can't believe you guys haven't tried looking for a proper working recovery and instead stuck here working out which CWM to use for the past 6 pages......what a waste of time LOL...
I haven't received my HongMi yet but even I understand how.........you just gotta read the posts made by others CAREFULLY. Here:
http://xiaomi.eu/community/threads/english-cwm-for-xiaomi-hongmi-td-wcdma-full-working.22953/page-6#post-194190
Look at the "Board" and "Revision" keyword in those...
Have you guys tried using Framaroot or KingoRoot to root your phones? I haven't received my HongMi yet so I couldn't try, but it seems kinda redundant to "flash an older ROM version just to get root, then flash CWM and THEN flash the latest stable ROM then root it finally".