FCs galore and USB storage wont allow changes

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Gday, Well I have spent 3 days searching, researching, trying, flashing, rooting, rummaging and swearing... and am back to exactly where I started, so going to go out on a limb, and ask for help:

I have my sisters old Galaxy S I9000, when booted up it force closes pretty much everything, all her apps she has on it, all google related apps including Market.
Factory reset via phone (privacy menu) option, recovery menu option, and dialler code option do nothing. By that I mean they say they are working, the phone reboots, yellow text suggests everything is being formatted and wiped, and then it reboots to exactly the same state.

I have flashed various 2.1, 2.2 and 2.3 firmwares, same result.
I have trie to flash custom ROMs, but can't because of the other problem; the USB storage appears to always stay unchanged no matter what I try to remove from it, or add to it (eg. zip files for installing). On my PC I can see the rive, and I can drag/drop zip files to it, I can even delete all the folders if I want, but when I disconnect the cable, the USB Storage in the phone is EXACTLY the same as it was before I connected it to the PC....

SOOOOOOOOOOO Frustrated....

I've searched high and low, forums galore, many seem to have had one problem or another, but nobody seems to have had exactly the same problems in their entirity. Even the forum I read about fixing the 'protected' USB storage suggested flashing a patch, which is a zip file, which is impossible for me to do as I can't write to the USB storage...

Your insight/wisdom/assistance o nthis matter would be GREATLY appreciated! Cheers in anticipation..

By the way, I am definitely talking about USB storage, the internal type, not my external sd card, I have had that removed for the last day or so to avoid any confusion. I currently have XXJPY 2.2.1 on the phone if that helps bt can change it to anything else that s Odin flashable if need be.

You say you had a patch thats a zip... If you have the external sd card put it on that, and then go recovery and install the zip, or however else you need to. Does it need to be on the internal sd card?

Or do you mean you can apply the zip but because you cant write to it it makes no difference?

Any chance your still on stock firmware then?

I can put zip on external SD card but when i choose install zip from card within recovery menu it shows USB storage folder, not external SD contents. Can't put zip file on USB storage as it wont let me write to it (even though it shows on my PC as having been added ok, at least up until i remount)

If xxjpy is stock firmware then i might be, but have tried several others and had same result. If u can recommend a different firmware ill happily dload and flash.

Im running darkcore, and the rom you see below, im not sure which CWM this is but i just checked with update from zip/sdcard and yes it showed me the internal sd card but just look for external sd, itll appera like everything else and i could go into it. So if it doesn't work in your current recovery menu, try install another one.

I've tried a few different recovery versions now, none show external SD card contents. But if i understand ur post correctly, ur suggesting that the external SD card shows within the USB storage list, like one of the folders on the USB storage? If that is the case, the only one it could be is /SD? But there is nothing in that, whereas there are several folders and zip files on my external SD card...