Structural control technologies that feature both nonlinear mass dampers namely nonlinear energy sinks (NES) and linear mass dampers, namely tuned mass dampers (TMD) are not only effective in reducing structural responses but also robust against loading changes and structural uncertainties. To study the control performance of single-mass dampers (SMD) and dual-mass dampers (DMS)，the responses of various control devices including a SMD, a DMD,an NES,and a TMD are analyzed when they are attached to an eight-degree-of-freedom primary structure, respectively. Those devices are optimized under impulsive excitations and further investigated when subject to seismic excitations. Spectral analysis is conducted to look into the control capacities of control methods with different degree of linearity and nonlinearity. Results show that nonlinear-linear combined methods are of higher performance than TMD and NES against seismic excitations.