Man, this is the same story as everything else in life right? People sleep on the hard way until they got no other choice and then it turns out the hard way actually works. I see it with cooking, with fixing cars, with everything. Cheap tools plus way too much time and patience beats fancy gear half the time anyway. 3 hours and a first try post is honestly a win no matter how ugly the process looked. As for the preheater, going straight from the top on a big chip is how you warp boards and lift pads, so if you plan on doing more of these, heating from below is worth it just to save your own butt. The stuck BGA was probably telling you something about heat spread, not about your skill.