MBA 2010 Can't Erase/Partition internal SSD

I was unable to boot my 13" 2010 MBA. Hanging grey screen with gear turning -- forever.
Tried recovery partition tools starting with First Aid but to no avail.
I decided to erase and reinstall os x lion. I am unable to do this so far.
1. I tried erasing the volume Macintosh HD. Volume Erase failed with the error: File system formatter failed.
2. I tried to erase the 121.33 GB Apple SSD. Disk Erase failed with the error: Couldn't unmount disk.
The disk is mounted since the recovery partition is what I'm using. So...
I rebooted with a good OS X Lion installation from an external USB drive (no problems), retried and got this result: Disk Erase failed with the error: Unable to write to the last block of the device.
3. If I try to partition the 121.33 GB Apple SSD I get: Parrtition failed with the error: Unable to write to the last block of the device.
I thought I would use superduper or ccc to clone back the (repaired) image of the SSD but when I launch either program they do not see the 121.33 GB Apple SSD so this route leads to a dead end also.
4. I tried using the Disk Utility Restore function using a variety of Sources and get the following error: An error (22) occurred while copying. (Invalid argument)
I am out of ideas. I can't take the SSD out of the macbook air and put it into an external enclosure and try formatting. I can't use the internet installation method since it is a 2010, and not 2011 Macbook Air.
I did a lot of googling and tried a lot of the suggestions but so far I'm stopped dead in my tracks. I am able to boot the macbook air using an external drive and recovery partition is usable, either on external drive or internal SSD.
If I could boot gparted or linux from a USB or CD/DVD I could use gparted (if it works) to reformat the internal SSD. But I can't figure out a way to do this, and the 13" 2010 MBA seems to have exceptions to the complex set or instructions that some people have found works with the non-2010 MBAs.
Any ideas would be greatly appreciated. I'm out of warranty and out of ideas.

From what I've read, the first step in downgrading is to use the disk utility and reformat from the recovery partition. Or let Snow Leopard do the same as part of the installation. This won't work. Unless Snow Leopard uses a different Disk Utility and that is where the error lies, in the Lion Disk Utility, I don't have much hope for this approach.
However, I would try it anyway's but I don't have any way of installing Snow Leopard. I don't think a DVD came with the 2010 MBA (if it did, I don't have it, nor a DVD drive although I've had limited success using a shared PC DVD drive ; i don't know if an install DVD would work using a shared PC DVDD drive).
If only I could boot to a gparted live partition from a USB stick or some such method (linux) I could try gparted but I don't know how to boot to gparted live on the MBA 2010. Again i have no problems booting from an exernal drive. I tried using fdisk, diskutil, etc. on the internal SSD but can't format it or delete partitions, one being the hidden recovery partition.
Very frustrating. I tried using ipartition but also to no avail. It kept giving me errors whenever Itried to reformat, repartition, unmount, etc..
I'm considering using the Genious Bar at Apple. Is this type of problem over their heads or might they be helpful? Perhaps it is a hardware problem with the SSD but I have no way of diagnosing that, AFAIK.

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ARealMac(PPC)User wrote:
...I found a few discussion threads on here somewhere where some users indicated that their original MacBook Airs, or other SSD-equipped MacBooks, were still performing quite well and responsively after a few years of use. Can anyone substantiate this for me? How long have you been using your SSD(s) in your Mac(s), and do you think the newer models will be able to last several years? I would greatly appreciate any insight.
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You also mention that you "will most likely use it to record several tracks and store my growing library of songs and videos." Why not instead use an external SSD connected via USB 3.0 for storage? They're relatively cheap, very fast, and keep the space on your internal working drive free. A BootCamp partition would also take up space, so you might consider using Windows in a Virtual Machine instead. VMware Fusion or Parallels would be installed on the internal SSD but the virtual machine files could go on the external.
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MBA 2010 Can't Erase/Partition internal SSD

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