Dell part stopped working after warranty?

My dell xps 420 computer has been working fine for 2 and a half years now, but 2 days ago my video card got fried. The computer was in standby mode with no programs open before that. When I came back to the computer 3 hours later the computer was OFF, I turned it on and the screen was heavily distorted, I immediately turned it off and opened the case. I had a friend around who is a pro at computer repair and maintenance who looked around inside and informed me that the video card was extremely hot (even though the computer had not been on). We got a compressed air canister I had in the home and turned it upside down to apply coolant directly to the heat sink. After refitting the video card and turning on the computer, the same screen distortions appeared. When we installed an older graphics card my friend had, the computer ran normally (though games were quite a bit slower due to the new gpu). My dell 2 year warranty is up, but is it at all possible to get dell to replace this part? I had not made any hardware changes to the computer and it is running the same OS and everything that came with it from the factory. Something in the computer seems to have malfunctioned and caused the video card to overheat while the computer was on standby (if the computer was fully on then the great heat sink and fan on it shouldn't have let it overheat while idling), not while me using the computer personally, it seems like this was not caused by any environmental issue or by me, the user.|||You will not be able to get Dell to replace that part after the warranty has expired. You are going to need to get a new Graphics Card. Here is a link to every graphics card that is compatible with your PC.



http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLis…



If you aren't into heavy gaming but want something with a little bit of power, get at least the nVidia 9800GT w/ 1GB of Memory or the ATI HD5760.



According to the Dell website, your PC's Power Supply is only 375 Watts. That is not a lot of power for that computer. You will want to upgrade your Power Supply to at least a 500 Watt Thermaltake or Antec if you plan on keeping this PC for a long time.



Edit: When you get a new Graphics Card, make sure that your computer will have enough power to make it work, otherwise you will have wasted your money. This is why I say to upgrade your PSU (Power Supply Unit)|||Buy a new graphics card. You can get a cheap one from Newegg.com. If you go through dell you will pay twice what the part is worth.|||No there is nothing Dell will do for you, these things happen that's why warranties end.



What I would be concerned with if the GPU fan did not fail then what did the motherboard do to cause the problem?

Is that a voltage regulator that fried? And where is it? See if anything on the MB is burnt/black and same on the GPU.

Bottom line is you need to replace the GPU, but is it going to fry again cause of the MB?