A host Ethernet adapter (HEA) and method of managing network communications is provided. The HEA includes a host interface configured for communication with a multi-core processor over a processor bus. The host interface comprises a receive processing element including a receive processor, a receive buffer and a scheduler for dispatching packets from the receive buffer to the receive processor; a send processing element including a send processor and a send buffer; and a completion queue scheduler (CQS) for dispatching completion queue elements (CQE) from the head of the completion queue (CQ) to threads of the multi-core processor in a network node mode. The method comprises operatively coupling an Ethernet adapter to a multi-core processor system via a processor bus, selectively assigning a first plurality of packets to a first queue pair for servicing in an endpoint mode, running a device driver on the multi-core processing system, the device driver controlling the servicing of the first queue pair by dispatching the first plurality of packets to only one processor core of the multi-core processor system, selectively assigning a second plurality of packets to a second queue pair for servicing in a network node mode; and the Ethernet adapter controlling the servicing of the second queue pair by dispatching the second plurality of packets to multiple processor threads.