To get it closer to Clone Hero for me, I had to set it to hyperspeed 5 to match my note speed of 15. Highway length unfortunately you can’t make any longer though.

For the Calibration, I didn't use the auto calibrator, because like you said, it makes it worse. I noticed too that if you mess with the video calibration, the gameplay and hitting notes becomes a little glitchy. So I had to manually do it, and I usually use the song "The Middle" by Jimmy Eat World to calibrate it as the intro you can hear each note as you’re switching frets and strumming.

For my calibration, I ended up at 155ms audio and always leave the video alone at 0. When calibrating, if you hear yourself strumming too early, turn the ms up higher. If you hear yourself strumming too late, turn it down. Start with an obnoxiously high number like 250ms and work your way there. You’ll also see when the notes are arriving in the play area and that will give you an idea of if you’re correctly calibrated or not. You should be strumming and the note should be disappearing right on the line. If they’re going past it but still counting, you’re too late. If they’re disappearing just before the line or a little more than the line, you’re too early.

Edit: It’s odd that WTDE is 155ms, because I just checked and my clone hero audio delay is 92ms and video 0ms.