static ip

i have recently purchused a laptop with vista home basic - the company i work
for is a repair shop and we are also an isp - all of our customers are giving
static ips therefore i use one myself - i have set up ststic ips a thousand
times but cannot get it to work on vista home basic - will this operating
system just not work with a static or am i missing something - i have set
statics up on higher levels of vista and it works great - home basic is my
only problem

thanks for any help in this