Macbook Pro can't boot up or reinstall OS X: is my hard drive dead?

I haven't been able to fix my Macbook Pro (2009, 13") for almost two weeks now, and I'm starting to get desperate.

Almost two weeks ago, I resumed my Mac from sleep and it started behaving funny. I wasn't able to start up apps, wifi was asking me to sign into networks that were already configured, etc. so I decided to reboot my Mac. Unfortunately, it has never booted up since...

Here's a summary of what I have tried to far (more or less in the order in which it happened):

• booted into Recovery mode by holding the Option key and tried fixing my disk through Disk Utility

  it found that the disk was corrupt but was not able to fix it

• tried booting into Bootcamp

  Windows says the disk is corrupt

• tried reinstalling OS X

  installer would just hang forever when trying to download additional components (the loading bar wouldn't even begin to load)

• tried formating my disk completely

  limited success: I still have two partitions on my hard drive (Macintosh HD and Bootcamp) and can't create a single partition using Disk Utility because it isn't able to unmount either partion. The partitions aren't fully wiped either; they still have a handful of files each that take up about half a gig. (Note: now neither partition will show up in the boot menu, only the Recovery Partition shows up)

• installed OS X on a pen drive using Lion DiskMaker so I could reinstall OS X directly from there

  I got the same results as before (hanging on component downloads)

• installed OS X on a pen drive using these instructions so I wouldn't need to download additional components

  close, but no cigar. The reinstallation starts, but after a few seconds, it gives me an error saying "The installer can't create the folder /Volumes/Macintosh HD/[...]"

• reset PVRAM and retried steps above

  still nothing

• gave up, tried installing Ubuntu from a recovery CD and completely wiping everything on my hard drive

  the installer just hangs after displaying a few errors such as "input/output error during write to /dev/sda"

• booted up into recovery and went into Terminal so I could use a command I'd probably never get a chance to use in any other circumstance: # rm -rf

  nothing happened 😟 (neither in my Macintosh HD directory nor in the root directory)

• tried reinstalling OS X again from USB, but this time to my Bootcamp partition

  the installer still can't create folders

• retried installing Ubuntu from CD

  still hangs, but this time, there's a new Windows partition shown when booting up (it has no OS installed though)

• retried installing Ubuntu again

  still hangs, and now I don't even have a recovery partition on my bootup screen (lol)

• when into Disk Utility (through USB) to try reformating the hard drive

  looks like Ubuntu was able to create some partions this time. However, when I tried creating a single Mac OS X Extended (Journaled) partition, it fails and gives me the following error: "Wiping volume data to prevent future accidental probing failed."

• now OS X can't find any drives to install itself on, so back to trying to install Ubuntu

  new error: "??? ???" w00t!

• one more time trying to install OS X from USB (now the only option in the boot menu besides the Ubuntu CD)

  attempted to wipe the hard drive again (now I have 3 partitions: disk0s1, disk0s2, Linux Swap), still doesn't let me create a single partition

• gave up, started flipping tables

I'm beginning to suspect that my hard drive may be dead. I have no clue how this happened (I don't recall having dropped my Mac), but since I can't install ANYTHING on it (neither OS X nor Ubuntu), it's the only explanation I can come up with. The last vaguely unusual thing I did with it was using a live CD to flash a stock image onto my Kindle (I wasn't able to update my Kindle manually) a couple of days before.

I don't know what else I can do now, does anyone have any suggestions?

Also, if my hard drive really is dead, what new one should I buy? I want an SSD, but I'm not sure which ones would be compatible with my Mac.

Thanks in advance!