I know lots of others answered but I’ll try to sum up some notes for you:

• Combustion releases a ton of extra stuff including a toxic cocktail of carcinogenics and carbon monoxide which are bad for your body. Some of these chemicals release the instant euphoric feeling followed by sedation. People who try dry vaporizing are expecting the same exact effects, when the reality is that it is cleaner and different.

• Different temperatures extract different active compounds from the herb. In general terms a Sativa vapes great at lower temps (300-385F) while Indica and CBD strains work better at higher temps to extract that sedation and pan relief you get from the herb. This means you can essentially “customize” your high to what you want/need at that time. If you have a hybrid for example you could cook out the low temperature sativa side in the morning, then cook the same herb at night to extract the indica side of the herb.

• Not all dry vaporizers cook at the same rate. They are essentially miniature ovens. Many people buy cheaper weaker underpowered devices preheat them and suck away like they’re hitting a waterpipe - this drains all heat out of the oven faster than the shitty heater can recover temps. The secret here is to either get a higher powered device, OR learn how to slow your roll and take a gentle sip (filling your lungs over 20 seconds instead of filling them in 3 seconds). This is partially why you hear people say vaporizers suck - because they are not obtaining a full extraction before they think it’s finished (since they’re getting no more vapor it must be fully cooked!).

• Unlike smoking where you can “Green out” from smoking too much (due to excessive carbon monoxide poisoning which causes you to start vomiting if you smoke too much too frequently), dry vaporizing does not do this. You can essentially get MORE medicated than possible with combustion because you’re not inhaling all that nasty toxic shit.

Dry vaporizers come in many shapes and sizes. Some cook faster, some produce tastier vapor for flavor-chasing snobs like myself, some produce bigger clouds, others better for social gatherings, or more stealthy, faster extraction, etc. Most of us true ents have multiple devices in our collection depending on our needs at the time.

LPT - you can pair almost any vaporizer with a waterpipe for some epic vaporbonging action. Price does not equate to performance, there are many other vaporizers besides “ball vapes” that can totally get you where you need to be. Hell on vacation when my preferred portable failed (bad battery), I bought a shitty no-name $85 vaporizer at a smoke shop and was able to make it work for my needs until I got back home lol.

If you let me know more about your budget and what you want to do I can probably set you on a better path than a ball vape - I’m personally not a fan of them for novice users for several reasons.

I started smoking with massive bong hits and I’ll never move away from that, so I needed to find a vaporizer that was able to provide what I was looking for. I’ve been through a long list, all with their own pros and cons and various “best” ways to use them.

I started with the FM V5.0s, then the Grasshopper, Arizer Air, Solo 2, VapeXhale Evo, then Mighty family with the Volcano and Plenty, Arizer V-Tower, then the Fury and the Tiny Might.

For bongs, most of these suck or have shortcomings. The Grasshopper (no longer available and should honestly be avoided) was incredible and served me very well, but the company was mishandled and effectively scammed people. However, it was the pinnacle of portable bong vaporizers - seriously unparalleled and its only shortcoming for me was you’d have to reload it if you wanted more than ~2 or 3 very large dense hits (i.e. group sessions). It’s too bad it’s unavailable, because it really was the best (“when it worked”, as the users memed).

The VapeXhale Evo, also no longer available sadly is the next best, only “second” to the Grasshopper for bong rips because it’s a desktop vape and it has a heatup time. But the pros outweigh those “cons” that make it “second”, easily reloadable baskets and the best convection bong rips on the market at the time. Alas, the company grew old and repurchased and rebranded until a new unit never released and they folded. The biggest loss aside is the ez-load bowls, since they are compatible with a number of devices. Anyway… it was nifty, it heated a glass element that heated the air and made it a full convection vape.

The Mighty is ok for bongs. I differentiate them via the actual glass and pressure of the bongs. Imagine a beaker bong or any bong that you hit and the smoke/vapor condenses in the glass before you carb it and get it all. The Mighty does not do that at all. The Mighty is a bubbler that you when you hit it you get some smoke/vapor - no condensing. It’s not my preference, so I personally am not very satisfied with the Mighty as a bong ripper when compared to my other options.

The Volcano is just loud. It’s fine, it’s fun to have the bong percolate itself but, well meh. It’s expensive and loud, it uses a lot of bud but it does put out a lot of vapor. The older V-Tower model is in a similar boat, it’s quieter but a little less efficient than the Volcano. I use them for gatherings. The Plenty is fairly disappointing.

The Arizer portables (I have the Air 1 and Solo 2) are weaker than the Mighty through glass so not what you’re looking for for bong rips.

Finally, for portables worth mentioning that leaves the Tiny Might. It’s a great vaporizer, I find it fairly comparable to the Grasshopper and I’m pleased with it overall. My only shortcoming for it is that I’m constantly reloading bowls, but otherwise it’s a strong consistent vaporizer.

But for you OP, I would suggest looking into Ball Vapes. I personally can’t 100% recommend any particular one as I’m unfamiliar with the specifics of each and what they all entail, but as a brief overview; ball vapes are desktop vapes controlled by an e-nail PiD controller and are essentially e-nails for convection heating. It’s actually just the exact concept of the VapeXhale Evo just inverted, since we are moving the heating elements to the top of the bowl (rather than it being confined).

You can build your own for about $100, but there are plenty of kits available from Cannabis Hardware or Vgoodiez (and I’m sure others, but you can’t go wrong with these two.)

After decades of nearly exclusive use of a bong and very occasional disappointing experimentation with various vaporizers, I never really found a vape device that could replace a bong for me.

That changed about a year ago. I bought a Tiny Might 2 and don’t use anything else now.

The device is expensive but is a great piece of hardware that works very well. Most importantly it can deliver massive hits. With a good cooling stem you can use it anywhere and it will allow you to do a hit that will rival a good bong hit and it tastes so much better.

But the best is that it comes with a glass water pipe attachment (WPA) that allows you to use it with a bong or water pipe. When I’m at home I use it exclusively with a bong. It uses less herb than combustion for the same or better effect with dramatically better flavor. It will produce very thick vapor and will give you a very satisfying bong hit - at higher temperatures it will produce very thick clouds. In fact you can turn the temperature up enough to combust whatever is in the chamber if you are so inclined. Another benefit is that your bong stays cleaner too.

I use the dosing capsules which keeps the device clean and helps a bit with efficiency. Specifically I use .10 grams in a dosing capsule and am often unable to finish in one hit. (I am a runner and can do huge hits) On the same bong with the same herb I would use a little bit more - maybe .13 grams if I were combusting it.

For me it is pretty close to the ideal device. It absolutely improved every aspect of my herbal experience. Of course YMMV but I’m a convert.