Thank you everyone. I'm coming to the conclusion that my G1 feeding my Harmony DAC is probably not going to be improved upon dramatically unless I enter the +$10K arena (list price of course) for an "All in One" unit like the Bartok (used), or the Esoteric N-05XD.
Is My 7 Year Old Aires G1 Still Relevant?
My Streamer/Server is an Auralic Aires G1 that I got when it came out in 2017. It still does everything I want, but has the sound quality improved over the years by very much. Currently my DAC is a Laiv Harmony through USB connection. I was considering one of the new Auralic Altair G2.2 as an all in one box, but if my G1 is just as good as today's stuff, at comparable pricing, that will open my choices to a whole lot of DAC' with a remote volume, but no streaming capabilities like the Altair.