Would a stand alone dac help, and how much?

I own a Mytek Brooklyn, which has a feature you want when streaming from these types of devices: outstanding jitter rejection.

Best,

E

The simple answer is yes. And again yes, a Bluesound Node 2i would be a good way to go.  But even if you just stick with the Sonos, to take advantage of a better DAC really need to subscribe to a streaming service that streams at CD or better quality such as Qobuz or Tidal.  Qobuz at $150 a year would be my choice (as it provides hi rez options w/o requiring MQA ...  Tidal provides hi rez via MQA ... and Bluesound does support both Qobuz and Tidal and does unfold MQA).  Bluesound does not currently support Pandora (it supports just about everything else, Pandora being the notable exception).  If Pandora is important to you can still keep the Sonos in the system and feed the Sonos output to the Node via Toslink to take advantage of the Node 2i's better DAC.  If you just get a separate stand alone DAC and stick just with the Sonos, then you can still do Qobuz or Tidal, but will top out at CD quality, and be limited to the rendering capability of the Sonos, which I don't think will be as good as the Node 2i.  If you go the stand alone DAC route, there are many good new and used DACs in your price range.  But all things being equal, I think the Bluesound Node 2i would be a good place to start, and then down the road, if you wish to up your game, can add a separate DAC to the mix fed by the Bluesound kit.  Good luck.

You could get a TEAC NT-505 for a little over your budget and it would be more in line with what you have in the rest of your system.  It's a streamer and DAC that will outclass the Node 2i.

If you want to stay in the Sonos ecosystem I’d take a look at replacing your Connect with the modified version from Wyred 4 Sound. Add a decent external DAC and you’re golden. 

@crn3371 is spot on. That’s the only way to get decent sound out of Connect. If you’re looking to sign up with Tidal or Qobuz, then $550 (Wyrd 4 Sound upgrade) is best spent towards another streamer other than Node 2i. Don’t think you will hear day n night improvement if you go analog out from Node 2i to Bryson preamp.

IMO, Node 2i really shines when paired with an external DAC like Ayre Codex or similar.

PS: I own both Connect and Vault 2.