At least one embodiment of the inventive technology may be described as a method for analyzing a hydrocarbon that comprises volatiles, said method comprising the steps of: segregating said volatiles from said hydrocarbon without oxidizing said hydrocarbon; generating a hydrocarbon residue and segregated hydrocarbon volatiles; and analyzing at least one of said hydrocarbon residue and said segregated hydrocarbon volatiles. The advantageous avoidance of oxidation may be achieved by placing the hydrocarbon under a vacuum, which may also enable the avoidance of cracking of the hydrocarbon while still achieving segregation of volatiles as desired. One other of the several embodiments disclosed and claimed herein may focus more on vacuum transfer and vacuum distillation of hydrocarbon volatiles. These and other methods disclosed herein may be used to achieve improved hydrocarbon analysis results.