[Q] CM11M6 contact insanity

I switched to CM11 M6 several weeks ago and for the most part, it's head and shoulders above any CM10.2 build I ever ran - CM10 was crashing left and right, CM11 has been rock solid - HOWEVER - one thing (well, two things) have been driving me nuts. The smaller one is the mail app - I HATE the GMail-ish 'thread' layout and 'colorfication' (There are no words to adequately describe how much GMail SUCKS - to have it seep into my Exchange mail is infuriating). Is there any way to can the 'new' format and get the old one back? But the thing that's REALLY driving me bananas is the contacts.

I only sync contacts from one of my three Exchange accounts. I also don't sync with GMail, Skype or any of the other accounts I use. JUST the one Exchange account. The other accounts don't have contacts selected for sync. On my S3, I've got a ridiculous number of random duplication of contacts and random contacts that I have NO idea where they came from (They APPEAR to be e-mail addresses that I have received messages from in the past).

For example, for one contact, there are three copies: one that is just his work address, and two that are exact duplicates of each other, right down to the picture I made part of his entry. Another contact I have three identical copies of. Another I have four different copies of. It's got some contacts that are more or less duplicates of others, but they're displayed as 'Lastname Firstname' in addition to the proper contact that is displayed as 'Firstname Lastname'. Another contact I have 8 (yes eight) copies of - Two duplicates and six with random other contact info.

The Contacts app claims I have 600 contacts - I don't have anywhere NEAR that - the vast majority seem to be e-mail addresses that I've sent and/or received messaged to/from.

Does anyone know WHERE THE HECK it's getting all this garbage from? I NEVER had any issues of this sort before with any other ROM or build...

Well, unfortunately, no dice. After upgrading to M7, I removed the account, rebooted to recovery, wiped cache and dalvik cache 5x each, booted back up and re set the account up - same deal. It's so random and stupid it's crazy.

It's funny you say that M6 was the buggiest of snapshots - This is really the only issue I've encountered. It's been absolutely rock solid for me otherwise. OTOH, CM10.2.x, which was supposed to have been polished, was total junk. Constant random freezes, reboots, FCs no matter what build or how I installed it.