Version = 2014.1
Input = Shapefiles
My shapefiles represent generalised footprints of groups of buildings so my first step is to Subdivide my shapes into individual footprints using the subdivide tool.
I start with 666 objects in my layer (a small town) but after subdividing I have almost 400 000 - this is ridiculous and not a number my computer can reasonably deal with - from a visual check I estimate that my largest initial object is subdivided into no more than 50 objects (this should mean the absolute maximum number of objects I should end up with is 30 000).
Here's a smaller example to illustrate:
Input = 2 objects
Subdivide settings - see image
Result - 31 objects, however visual count suggests there should only be 20 - see image.
It appears that some footprints have been duplicates - see image 
ETA -- I seem to get the same outcome in v2012.1
ETA_2 -- Attributes get completely screwed up too. So in my first example (666 initial shapes --> ~400 000 objects), I look at one footprint and I find that there are 127 duplicates - and all of them have different attributes i.e.
Duplicate1: Category = RES, Area = 3005
Duplicate2: Category = RES, Area = 2676
Duplicate3: Category = COM, Area = 17165
Duplicate4: Category = IND, Area = 22046
etc.
