Video Card fried itself

So, I accidentally left my PC on over night last night, while running EQII on High Settings. I've left my computer on over night a million times before, and never had any problems, so I didn't think I had one.

I played this morning, and then left the game running this afternoon while I ran some errands for a few hours. When I came back my PC was off, and it wouldn't start (wouldn't turn on at all). So I unplugged the video card, and oila it started... so I re-plugged it hoping to god it was a faulty connection or something (had to remove the faceplates to fit it orginally, it's a discontinued ASUS EN7800 and is frickin huge), and there was a large spark on the circuity of the card... so it's done.

(wasn't overlclocking)

The computer still turns on and SOUNDS fine, but I can't see if it boots properly without a video card... so I hope a fried video card doesn't usually fry other hardware?

So anyways, I'm looking for a replacement GPU, and my price range is only around 130 dollars. Luckily it seems the price of video cards went down dramatically in the last couple years. Here's what I found on Ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...em=260173052609&_trksid=p3984.cTODAY.m238.lVI

Have to use Ebay because newegg/zipzoomfly do not ship to Europe. And also, my motherboard is about 2 years old and has the stander PCI slots (the ones you plug modems/sound cards into), and one PCIE x16... the description on the video card above says PCI Express, so I'm hoping it's compatible?

-Thanks :cool

 

rather than an 8600GT, id get an 8600GTS for only $30 more. It performs a decent amount better for a really good price. Was that a 7800 you had before? if so, then your PSU should handle this card just fine.

If you're getting HDD activity on startup then you're most likely ok as far as the health of your other parts

linky to card: http://cgi.ebay.com/XFX-GEFORCE-860...ryZ80192QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

I have a 450 PSU, so I'm fairly confident I can handle most things.

Thanks for the link to the other card! Something that makes me question whether it's better though is that it's only a 256mb where the other is 512mb?

And yes I hear the hard drives running. So that must mean the motherboard is fine? Besides those two things, I guess I can probably assume they're ok then...

 

Yes it's compatible with your pci-e 16x slot because i bought an diamond 1550 pci-e card for my hp machine (it too has a pci-e x16 slot) and it worked. Plus i know how it feels when you have a video card die on you, I had one die in my old gateway machine (it was a ati x1300 pro agp 256) i had the same things happen except i didn't leave it on, Ijust powered it up on day (after leaving it off for quite a while ( Beacuse i bought a hp machine) and it wouldn't boot and after trying everything i could think of to get it to boot i took out my ati card and put in a old nvidia geforce 5700fx card in and it booted but would not boot when i put my ati card back in)).