Which type of storage device uses jumper settings to configure connections?

Hard drives, particularly traditional spinning disk drives (HDDs) and some solid-state drives (SSDs), utilize jumper settings to configure connections for various operational parameters. Jumpers are small connectors on the hard drive's circuit board that can be set in different configurations to indicate the mode of the drive, such as master, slave, or cable select, depending on the specific needs of the system in which the drive is installed.

This configuration is especially relevant in environments where multiple drives are installed, facilitating proper recognition and communication between the drives and the motherboard. The use of jumpers is primarily associated with older IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics) drives, as modern SATA drives do not typically require jumper settings for configuration.

In contrast, USB drives, flash drives, and memory cards do not utilize jumper settings. These devices are typically plug-and-play, automatically recognized by the operating system upon connection without any need for physical configuration.