I think I've got what your asking here. If I've got you correctly, just back up your save data to a usb device, and then do a copy onto the 3.41 system. I update a 1gb usb stick with my game saves before I transfer over patches so I don't have to trip on it if I have to do another transfer it saves a crap load of time.

Otherwise if you have a handful of SATA 2.5" hard disks around you can go that route as well.

Its hard to explain but what i mean is, if i back up my data 5 times with different patches on my ps3 (which is on 3.41) and i update the same ps3 to 3.55, can i restore my ps3 with the backed up data that i made when the ps3 was back on the 3.41 firmware.

Yes, you should be able to without a problem being that it is the same system. I don't see why you'd want to update a 3.41 to 3.55 though.

You'd effectively be cutting yourself off. Would be like a crack head in a glass room a big ol' pile of crack on the other side of the unbreakable glass. lol

It's because my other ps3 broke :/. So i want to know if i would still be able to change patches even though i'm on 3.55 thats all.

I'd use a few different hard disks to do it if that's the case. Would save a ton of time. 20gb drives are almost free these days.

I can't find 20GB harddrives ANYWHERE. Where do you get yours?