[Technology columnist Walter S. Mossberg answers readers' questions]

Q: In your spring buyer's guide, you wrote that adequate graphics chips will be more important than ever, but in the past you've advised that memory, or RAM, was key to speed and performance. Can you now get the same gains by buying or adding a better graphics chip? Or is RAM just as important as ever?

A: There are lots of things that can improve the performance of a PC or Mac. But adding memory still gives you more bang for the buck than any other, in my view. What I was saying last week is that the forthcoming Microsoft and Apple operating systems will be relying more on graphics chips to help take some of the load off the main processor and speed up certain tasks. Even so, a better graphics chip isn't a substitute for more main memory. In fact, most moderately priced computers use so-called integrated graphics chips, which lack dedicated memory and share some of the computer's main RAM. So having plenty of main memory is directly related to getting the most out of such graphics chips.

Q: Can the iPhone be connected to desktop peripherals? I want to be able to plug my iPhone into a large monitor and printer.

A: There are already several apps, including one from Hewlett-Packard, that allow you to print photos wirelessly from an iPhone to a printer that's connected to a Wi-Fi network. But, as far as I know, there is nothing on the market today that can connect an iPhone to an external monitor or keyboard, or to a printer for nonphoto printing. However, Apple has announced that the new 3.0 version of the iPhone operating system, due this summer, will enhance the ability of the iPhone to work with add-on hardware, either via cables or wirelessly. The company showed this off with medical devices, but it's possible that some third party could make it work with monitors or printers or keyboards.

Q: A recent article in the Journal reported that a person had installed the Mac operating system on a Windows laptop. Is this really possible and is it legal?

A: Apple doesn't sell or license its Mac OS X operating system for use on non-Apple hardware. In fact, the company considers it illegal to install OS X on other brands of computers. Nor does it produce OS X drivers for non-Apple hardware features that are built into competitors' computers. Nevertheless, some computer hobbyists have installed OS X on non-Apple hardware, and posted photos and videos online to prove it.

Even if you are willing to ignore the legal issues, this process, while not brain surgery, takes more skill than the average user possesses. And, in the end, some features of the computer may wind up disabled or require workarounds to function. For instance, on one such machine I saw, the speaker port didn't work with the Mac OS.

專(zhuān)欄作家莫博士就有關(guān)電腦和其他電子設(shè)備的常見(jiàn)技術(shù)問(wèn)題答讀者問(wèn)。

問(wèn)：在春季給買(mǎi)家的建議中，你提到合適的顯卡將比以前任何時(shí)候都更加重要，但過(guò)去你曾建議說(shuō)，內(nèi)存才是對(duì)速度和性能至關(guān)重要的。現(xiàn)在如果購(gòu)買(mǎi)或增加性能更好的顯卡，電腦性能也能同樣改善嗎？還是說(shuō)內(nèi)存依然一如既往地重要？

答：有很多方式都可以改善PC或Mac電腦的性能。但在我看來(lái)，增加內(nèi)存還是比其他的辦法性?xún)r(jià)比更高。我上周的意思是說(shuō)，微軟(Microsoft Co.)和蘋(píng)果公司(Apple Inc.)即將推出的操作系統(tǒng)將更多地依賴(lài)顯卡來(lái)幫助減輕主處理器的負(fù)擔(dān)，從而加快某些任務(wù)的運(yùn)行速度。即便如此，更好的顯卡也替代不了更大容量?jī)?nèi)存的作用。事實(shí)上，大多數(shù)中等價(jià)位的電腦都使用所謂的集成顯卡，這種顯卡沒(méi)有單獨(dú)的緩存，需要共享電腦的主內(nèi)存。因此有很大的內(nèi)存空間就直接關(guān)系到讓這類(lèi)顯卡發(fā)揮最大的作用。

問(wèn)：iPhone能連接桌面設(shè)備嗎？我想將iPhone接入大屏幕顯示器和打印機(jī)。

答：已經(jīng)有一些應(yīng)用軟件可以讓你從iPhone通過(guò)無(wú)線網(wǎng)絡(luò)(Wi-Fi)連接打印機(jī)打印照片，其中有一款是惠普公司(Hewlett-Packard)的產(chǎn)品。但據(jù)我所知，市場(chǎng)目前還沒(méi)有能讓iPhone連接外部顯示器或鍵盤(pán)的產(chǎn)品，或是連接打印機(jī)打印非照片文檔。不過(guò)，蘋(píng)果公司已經(jīng)宣布，今年夏天即將發(fā)布的iPhone操作系統(tǒng)3.0版本將通過(guò)無(wú)線或有線連接提高iPhone與外接硬件的兼容性。蘋(píng)果公司展示了iPhone與醫(yī)療設(shè)備連接的情況，但很可能會(huì)有第三方公司讓它兼容顯示器、打印機(jī)或鍵盤(pán)。

問(wèn)：《華爾街日?qǐng)?bào)》不久前的一篇文章說(shuō)有個(gè)人在一臺(tái)Windows筆記本電腦上安裝了Mac操作系統(tǒng)。這真的可能實(shí)現(xiàn)嗎，是否合法？

答：蘋(píng)果并不出售或授權(quán)其Mac OS X操作系統(tǒng)用于非蘋(píng)果公司生產(chǎn)的硬件。事實(shí)上，蘋(píng)果公司認(rèn)為在其他品牌電腦上安裝OS X是非法行為。該公司也不為競(jìng)爭(zhēng)對(duì)手的電腦內(nèi)置的非蘋(píng)果硬件設(shè)備生產(chǎn)OS X驅(qū)動(dòng)程序。不過(guò)，一些電腦愛(ài)好者在非蘋(píng)果公司的硬件設(shè)備上安裝了OS X操作系統(tǒng)，并在網(wǎng)上發(fā)布了照片和視頻以為證明。

即使不考慮法律問(wèn)題，在Windows電腦上安裝蘋(píng)果操作系統(tǒng)雖然不像腦外科手術(shù)那么復(fù)雜，但需要的技巧也比普通用戶(hù)所掌握的更多。最終，電腦的某些功能可能會(huì)失靈，或是需要替代方案才能運(yùn)行。比如說(shuō)，我就看到過(guò)一臺(tái)這樣的電腦，它的音箱無(wú)法兼容Mac OS。