Weird Win7 issue

I have a 2.5" 160GB drive which I can place in my external eSATA dock and Win7 finds it and adds it, I need to run FAT32 on it so create for example a 10gb partition and format it FAT32 within Win7, I've also tried 3rd party apps that make the partition 160GB and format it FAT32 it makes no odds which method.

The problem is I copy files to it etc and it doesn't complain. Remove disk, re insert it later on and everything on it will have vanished like I never did it, it does seem I can create a folder and it will stay there, the files I've tried copying are not large, at most 40mb.

If I repeat the same but with NTFS it's fine and files stay so what's going on?
If I mount the disk on the iPad which is what I intended to use it for it recognises it and I can copy files from the system to the HDD and they show up in Win7 just not when I do it in Win7.

What's going on?

No one?

How long does it leave them in the buffer then?
I've left it 10 minutes before with the same result but I can't see a way of removing the drive besides pulling it out of the dock or powering the dock off. It doesn't get a 'safely remove hardware' option like USB devices.

Nope no icon like with USB devices, it would be a bit like ejecting your C: drive :)