Heyhey! =)

I've been experiencing this for a while now.
The thing is that background stuff (planets,...) always "eat up" the scenery geometry.
WHAT? Yes, when the scenery lines up with e.g. a planet in the background it seems it would disappear behind it. This is paticulary annoying when the whole station disappears and you can just find it by somehow feel your way to it... :)
Could be wrong, but I think I get this since the background has been reworked for real-rotating planets and stuff.

Tech Info:
GeForce 4 420 Go
PIII Mobile, 1.8GHz
512 MB RAM
Ubuntu Linux, latest Kernel and NVidia Drivers.

Can post pics if needed as soon as i get back from work :)

Cheers,
Mr Hanky's cousin.

It *might* be the shader support that does this, although I don't know why planets would be worse then objects nearby. Anyway, you should turn your video settings to the lowest across the board and see if happens.

Also, see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeForce_4_Series#Known_problems