Silly question, DomoKum... With all the things we've been trying (such as tying DTR to pin 1), in each instance, did you try it with pins 2/3 both straight and swapped? Or did you assume that you had the correct crossover for each experiment, and tried it only with the pins straight?

Everything you've tried, should have been tried twice, once with each of the two possible configurations of pins 2 and 3.