Mandrake 10.x - Gvim 'split open' corrupts opened files and leaves ghost swapfiles
 

Good day.

I'm having a rather peculiar problem that started in Mandrake 10, and also seems to exist in Mandrake 10.1, both with Gvim.
What I use to recreate this problem:
1. a generic 32MB USB flash pen drive - write enabled
2. Gvim 6.3.20
3. a set of *.php files

How the problem occurs:
1. Insert pen, wait a second for mount, browse to folder with *.php files
2. Start Gvim, and make it open, say, index.php
3. Use Gvim's split-open function to load Template_Page.php in the same window

What happens:
Gvim will complain that '.Template_Page.php.swp' already exists, and that the swapfile is newer than the one it tried to create. Usual options to edit anyway/recover/delete/cancel appear in a separate window and as warning text inside the editor.
So far it seems that whatever option I choose, I can actually edit the file(s), but when I close them they will have disappeared from my flash drive, along with their usual <file>.php~ file that Gvim likes to create, and the swapfiles are also gone. Gvim also seems to create a swapfile under a different name, such as '.<filename>.php.swo'

Either way, I end up having to dig out the remains of my files with a Windows machine using Scandisk, and puzzling back together the pieces from the 'found.xxx' files with a plain text editor.

What is happening here and how do I stop it from happening? I have no such problems with the Windows version of Gvim, and I also have never encountered this before in Mandrake versions <9. is it Gvim itself, is it how the USB pen is accessed, file caching, ??