Nutty,
I am another happy Pontus II owner, but not the anniversary.....though I'm sure it's even better. I do use the Iris DDC outputting I2S between my Node 130 and the Pontus II, though I'll be replacing the Node later this year for a better streamer. Then I'll assess if the DDC vs whatever streamer I choose is needed.
And no the Pontus is not "over hyped", in my opinion it's the best DAC anywhere near $2,500.