A computing system, comprising a host computer system, a primary data packet communication protocol (such as TCP/IP) offload engine configured to act as an offload engine for the host computer system, and an alternate data packet communication protocol (such as TCP/IP) offload engine configured to act as an offload engine for the host computer system if the primary offload engine fails. The host computer system, the primary offload engine and the alternate offload engine are in data communication, the primary offload engine is configured to save predefined data packet communication protocol parameters to the host computer system during normal operation, the alternate offload engine is configured to retrieve the parameters from the host computer system if the primary offload engine fails.