1) Remove the network manager (this will remove the applet), go to the "install and Remove applications" available in the option menu System, find the Network Manager and remove.
2) Edit /etc/network/interfaces according to your needs. In my case my ethernet card is eth0 and my static IP will be 192.168.1.253
barenca@development:~$ sudo vi /etc/network/interfaces
auto lo eth0
iface lo inet loopback
iface eth0 inet static
address 192.168.1.253
netmask 255.255.255.0
network 192.168.1.0
broadcast 192.168.1.255
gateway 192.168.1.1
3) Add your DNS in the file /etc/resolv.conf
barenca@development:~$ sudo vi /etc/resolv.conf
# Generated by NetworkManager
nameserver 200.33.146.241
nameserver 200.33.146.249
4) Restart the service
barenca@development:~$ sudo /etc/init.d/networking restart
5) Test your connection. If no connection, do not worry, just restart and that's it!.
