@lapser
I've got c firmware (upgraded from b by Cannon official updater) and it is affected by the bug.
The link I referred to looks like it updates to firmware "e", so if you've got "c", it could be the cause of this elusive bug. What firmware revisions do those 60 cameras have? Can you find an "f" camera and test it? There's no "e" CHDK port yet.
Canon says the bug is in video/audio sync, so it's probably not causing this problem, but it's worth checking.
Assuming we've eliminated hardware problems, it sounds like something in CHDK could be storing a byte in the Lua part of memory. There might be an incorrect pointer in the camera specific code somewhere? If a single random byte of lua code was changed, it would give different strange errors like this. Of course, a bug in Lua could do this, but since it's only on this camera, a bug in CHDK seems more likely.
Has anyone gone through the camera specific code looking for pointer problems? It would be useful to know which firmware ports have the problem. We know the "c" version has it. @outslider, do you remember having the bug with your old "b" firmware too?